It's becoming a more and more common story in 老澳门六合彩开奖记录资料: local tradespeople are working but not getting paid for it.
Last month we brought you the saga of 老澳门六合彩开奖记录资料's Holiday Inn Express, which found itself hit with a host of builder liens from sub-trades who alleged non-payment.
This week it's a private house under construction in Whistler, which is the subject of builder liens, with hundreds of thousands in payments to 老澳门六合彩开奖记录资料-based sub trades claimed.
A lien in itself is not an order to pay: it's an action that puts a claim against the property's title, which makes it difficult for a landowner to sell or obtain financing for the property. It then gives the claimant a year to file suit in B.C. Supreme Court to prove its claim.
It costs a tradesperson money to place a lien on a property, and more money to enforce it if a landowner fights or ignores the claim - money that a tradesperson often doesn't have, because they haven't been paid.
The story is far from black-and-white - it's not always some big faceless company who is refusing to pay the little guy. The dispute can be between a contractor and a sub trade, or between sub trades and workers. But wherever it starts, it generally trickles down to the individual worker.
And the impact trickles down even further - those people who don't get paid are themselves not able to pay rent or mortgages, groceries or gas. They can't support local businesses. Non-payment for services rendered affects us all.
It's clear that we need to encourage development to stimulate our still-moribund economy, and we must have a competitive system that attracts that development.
There has to be a way to ensure that when people work, they get paid - sooner rather than later - without choking the industry. Draconian rules will solve the problem, but only by stopping development in its tracks.
A possible solution could be to fast-track the lien resolution process through an arbitration body similar to the landlord-tenancy branch rather than through the more cumbersome and expensive court system.
Another suggestion would be for the province to establish a trust fund for sub-trades to receive at least partial payment of their lien claims while they go through arbitration. This could be funded by the Property Transfer Tax - which generated more than $700 million in general revenue for the province in 2008-2009.
The current liens and lien enforcement system works as a deterrent in good times - the threat of not being able to sell or finance a property in a hot market is more potent. But when times are tougher, as they are now, it clearly fails those who don't have the means to fight.
-Tim Shoults
