Checked: BC Conservatives on Harm Reduction Vending Machines

published on September 6, 2024 by Michelle Gamage in The Tyee

“Let’s go get a free crack pipe and cocaine smoking kit,” says Conservative Party of BC candidate Gwen O’Mahony, looking stonily at the camera.

O’Mahony, who is running in the new Nanaimo-Lantzville riding, is the former NDP MLA for Chilliwack-Hope. According to her Conservative candidate page, she left the NDP after calling for trans women to be banned from women’s sports and prisons, and after the NDP said it would support decriminalization of personal amounts of unregulated substances.

Banning trans women from sports is not a policy supported by the Canadian Centre for Ethics in Sport, as it discriminates against trans athletes.

In a video posted to X on Aug. 26, O’Mahony accesses a free vending machine that dispenses harm reduction supplies at the entrance to the Nanaimo hospital’s emergency department…