So while ITQ was busily burrowing through bankruptcy documents — oh, don’t worry, she lives for that stuff — the ever vigilant Colleague Wells was on PBOWatch. Or OPBOWatch, as the case may be.
That was, in fact, what struck ITQ most about this latest campaign, which calls on supporters to sign on to an open letter that urges parliamentarians to ensure the budget officer’s independence by making him a full Officer of Parliament. Instead of employing the more familiar short form — ”PBO”, which can refer to either the office or the officer — the site’s creator, UBC economist Kevin Milligan, consistently uses “OPBO”, which stands for “Office of the Parliamentary Budget Officer” .
Now, this could be just a semantic quirk, but it may reflect a subtle attempt to move the debate away from the individual who currently holds the job — the embattled but unbowing Kevin Page — to the office itself, focusing on policy, rather than the personalities involved. Which suggests that at least some (O)PBObackers may be preparing themselves for the possibility that Page himself may eventually no longer be a factor – and, if Colleague Wells is right, that “eventually” may turn out to be sooner rather than later.
