Skip to content

OUR VIEW: Someone define respect for Surrey mayor

There needs to be a reckoning over Safe Surrey Coalition twitter post
21727734_web1_200604-SUL-EditorialSSCtweet-tweet_1
Outside council chambers, inside Surrey City Hall. (File photo)

Many will agree with Surrey Councillor Doug Elford when he says, “Twitter is a sewer.”

Sadly, though, his Safe Surrey Coalition has been wallowing, luxuriating even, in its mire.

And, not only in this most recent instance, in which a so-called “unauthorized person,” who, at that moment at least, was in complete control of the keys when he or she accused the police of murder in posts on Twitter and Facebook.

The civic slate has been engaged in a sustained smear campaign against the RCMP through its social media posts, digging up whatever it can find to put the Mounties in a bad light. This particular example, while the most egregious, is not a one-off.

Not only was the post beneath contempt, but that it was posted under the banner of a civic slate, one with majority control of Surrey’s affairs, is beyond disturbing.

READ ALSO: All Safe Surrey Coalition council members must ‘step up’ over ‘bad taste’ tweets, rivals say

READ ALSO: Safe Surrey under fire for ‘sickening’ social media posts accusing RCMP of murder

For Mayor Doug McCallum, after all has been said and done, to claim he, “and certainly Safe Surrey Coalition, have tremendous respect for the RCMP,” brings to mind the words of Humpty Dumpty: “When I use a word, it means just what I choose it to mean – neither more nor less.”

Speaking of eggs, surely the cracks now running through the SSC’s shell, resulting from the shock waves produced by its own political social media grenade, cannot simply be repaired with an “oops,” and vows to not allow it to happen again. That’s not enough.

There needs to be a reckoning, if this civic slate is to exorcise itself, in the public eye at least, from whatever foul processes that hatched such an unfortunate social media post in the first place.

Now-Leader



edit@surreynowleader.com

Like us on Facebook and follow us on Twitter