Anne Kang or Joshua Domnich: who should Burnaby Centre trust with its hospital and its public money?

“Bad things happen when good people do nothing.”

That line sits in the middle of Joshua Domnich’s candidate biography, as the thing he believes. Domnich is the Conservative candidate in Burnaby Centre, the west Burnaby riding between the Trans-Canada Highway and Kingsway that takes in the main BCIT campus and the neighbourhoods of Marlborough and Douglas-Gilpin.¹² He studied criminology at Simon Fraser University’s Burnaby campus, ran landscaping crews for more than a decade, and then worked inside the Legislature as a legislative assistant to four Conservative MLAs. He says he is running because “he believes in accountability and integrity in government.”¹

Accountability is a fair test to bring to this riding, because its MLA has been in cabinet since 2020. On the afternoon of 24 February 2026, Anne Kang rose in the Legislature to answer her government’s budget. She spoke, as she put it, “as the Minister of Tourism, Arts, Culture and Sport and the MLA for Burnaby Centre.” Then she turned to home.³

The budget she was answering had been presented one week earlier, on 17 February. It had taken Phase 2 of that same hospital off the province’s active capital construction schedule and given it no new completion date.⁴⁵ The Burnaby Hospital & Community Foundation, whose donors had already given to the project, said there had been “no warning.”⁶

Nine weeks after her speech, the construction contract for Phase 2 was cancelled. This is the record of the minister who asks Burnaby Centre for a fourth term, set beside the record of the man who wants to hold her government to account.

Before the record, here is where each of them stands, in their own words.

Anne Kang

BC NDP MLA, Burnaby Centre; Minister of Tourism, Arts, Culture and Sport

Before

Burnaby teacher; three terms on Burnaby City Council

MLA

Since 2017: Burnaby-Deer Lake, then Burnaby Centre from 2024

Cabinet

Since January 2020, in five portfolios

Now

Tourism, Arts, Culture and Sport, since 17 July 2025

In the House

“This province is investing … $1.7 billion in phase 2.”

Portrait: BC NDP

01 Anne Kang told the Legislature Phase 2 was funded a week after her government’s budget had put it on hold.

Burnaby Hospital opened in 1952. Phase 1 of its rebuild, a new pavilion and surgery centre, opened to patients this spring, three years after the date first set for it. Phase 2 is the part that adds beds: a 160-bed inpatient tower and a BC Cancer Centre, approved by Treasury Board in 2023 at $1.8 billion and first slated to follow by 2027.⁵⁹¹⁰ Burnaby has 0.58 acute care beds for every 1,000 people. The B.C. average is 1.46.⁵

She described the full project, two towers and 399 beds. Then she said this about the budget that had just paused it:³

• 17 February 2026Budget 2026 was presented. Phase 2 was moved off the active construction schedule, with no completion date.⁴⁵
• 24 February 2026Kang told the House the province was “investing … $1.7 billion in phase 2.”³
• 29 April 2026Bowinn Ma, the Minister of Infrastructure, confirmed in the House that “the alliance contract is being cancelled.”¹¹
• 27 May 2026Premier David Eby: “It is correct that we have paused those projects.”¹²
• 28 May 2026The House rose for the last time before the election. Kang has not raised the hospital in it since the contract was cancelled.¹³

The foundation’s chief executive, Kristy James, put the community’s position plainly when the contract went: “We have been consistently reassured by our Burnaby MLAs and Minister Ma that this project is not cancelled – but a terminated contract with no confirmed start date sounds like a cancellation.”¹⁴

On 6 May, Ma thanked “the members of the government caucus who serve Burnaby so diligently for their stalwart advocacy.”¹⁵ If Kang made that case, she made it in private. In the chamber, from the day the contract was cancelled to the day the House rose on 28 May, she spoke once, and it was to thank the Legislature’s staff.¹³

In our view, a minister who tells the House a project is funded, a week after her own budget has shelved it, owes Burnaby an explanation. Burnaby Centre never got one.

02 As Minister of Tourism, Arts, Culture and Sport, Anne Kang answered for a World Cup bill that kept climbing.

When Vancouver was named a host city in June 2022, the provincial government said the World Cup would “carry a total cost between $240 million and $260 million.”¹⁶ By June 2025 the gross estimate was $532 million to $624 million. Kang took over the ministry on 17 July 2025.¹⁷¹⁸

On 29 May 2026 she released the next update with Ravi Kahlon, the Minister of Jobs and Economic Growth. The gross cost of seven matches at BC Place was now $685 million to $729 million, or, as CTV News worked it out, “more than $100 million a match at the high end.”¹⁷ Kang’s statement led with a different number:

The net figure she cited, $90 million to $114 million, is what remains after the province counts $216 million in federal money, a hotel tax on Vancouver visitors and other revenue against the bill.¹⁷ The gross figure is what the tournament cost the public sector to stage. It had nearly tripled since 2022, and it rose again on her watch.

When Rob Botterell, the BC Green MLA for Saanich North and the Islands, asked her in November 2025 what safeguards protected British Columbians from “yet another runaway megaproject,” her answer began: “Hosting a FIFA 2026 is an exciting opportunity for British Columbia, and we are so excited to be doing preparations with our partners.” It did not mention the cost.¹⁹ After the last match in July she said: “I’m very confident that we will be able to find a very positive output in terms of revenue dollars.” Destination Vancouver reported hotel occupancy that June of about 75 per cent, down from about 91 per cent the year before.²⁰

The tournament and the hospital sit in different budgets, and the province says the World Cup’s net cost is far smaller than its gross cost. But a government shows its priorities in what it defends. In our view, Burnaby watched its minister call a nearly tripled bill “disciplined financial management” in the same spring that its hospital tower was told to wait.

03 Anne Kang has sat in cabinet since 2020, and in this campaign she answered no one who wrote to her online.

Kang is a former Burnaby teacher and a three-term city councillor, and she has been an MLA since 2017.⁷ She joined cabinet in January 2020 and has since held five portfolios: Citizens’ Services; Advanced Education; Municipal Affairs; Post-Secondary Education and Future Skills; and, since July 2025, Tourism, Arts, Culture and Sport.¹⁸

We read her campaign accounts from 22 September to 17 October. She wrote all 24 of the campaign posts we read on Facebook and Instagram herself, and she left replies open on every one. That is to her credit. But under 13 of those posts we read 6 comments from the public, and we found no reply from her to any of them. Her X account, with 5,608 followers, has not posted since 1 September.⁸

04 Joshua Domnich says he is running because government owes people accountability and integrity.

Joshua Domnich

Conservative Party of BC candidate, Burnaby Centre

Education

BA in Criminology, Simon Fraser University, Burnaby campus

Languages

English and French; valedictorian of his immersion class

Legislature

Legislative assistant to the Conservative caucus, supporting four MLAs

Constituents

Community liaison officer for a federal Conservative MP

Before

More than a decade in landscaping operations and management

Why he runs

“Accountability and integrity in government”

Portrait: Conservative Party of BC

Joshua Domnich is the Conservative Party of BC candidate in Burnaby Centre. He studied criminology at Simon Fraser University’s Burnaby campus. He spent more than a decade running landscaping crews and projects before he moved into public service, first as a community liaison officer for a federal Conservative MP and then at the Legislature, as a legislative assistant supporting four Conservative MLAs.¹

He is a first-time candidate; BC Ballot found no earlier run for any office.²¹ His public record in this campaign is his party biography, and it is short. He has not spent six years in cabinet, and he has no ministerial bill to answer for. What he brings is a working knowledge of the Legislature from the staff side, where he supported four MLAs with their legislative work and research, and a decade of keeping crews and projects on track.¹

Here is the incumbent’s record, measure by measure, beside what he says he stands for.

In our view, the choice in Burnaby Centre is between a minister who has had six years and five portfolios to deliver, and a candidate who says the job starts with showing up. On the hospital, she has had her chance.

05 Burnaby Centre leans NDP, and 2,486 votes is the gap Joshua Domnich has to close.

338Canada, which turns the published polls into a projection for every riding, rates Burnaby Centre as leaning NDP. Its update of 16 October puts the BC NDP at 50% and the Conservatives at 44%, each with a margin of eight points either way, so the two ranges overlap.²²

Burnaby Centre, projected vote

338Canada, update of 16 October 2026. Bars show the projection; the thin lines show its margin either way.²²

Anne Kang, BC NDP

50%

Joshua Domnich, Conservative

44%

Vikas Gautam, CentreBC

3%

Shila Taheri, BC Green

3%

0%30%60%

Vikas Gautam of CentreBC and Shila Taheri of the BC Greens are each projected at 3%. Only Domnich is within reach of Kang.²²⁷

In 2024, Kang held the riding by 2,486 votes over the Conservative candidate, Dharam Kajal: 9,780 to 7,294. If about 1,250 of her voters had chosen the Conservative instead, the seat would have changed hands.²³

In our view, a six-point projection and a 2,486-vote margin are a gap that a candidate who shows up can close.

06 She called the hospital the heart of what Burnaby wants. Burnaby Centre can hold her to it.

Advance voting runs from 16 to 21 October, and Final Voting Day is 24 October.²⁴

On 24 February, Anne Kang told the Legislature that the hospital “captures the heart of what people want from the government.” She was right about that. Nine weeks later the contract for its new tower was gone, and she did not rise in the House to say a word about it.³¹³

Joshua Domnich’s biography says he believes that bad things happen when good people do nothing. On the hospital, in our view, Burnaby Centre has already seen what doing nothing looks like.¹

Bad things happen when good people do nothing. In our view, Joshua Domnich has given Burnaby Centre a reason to do something.