British Columbia

British Columbia, also commonly referred to by its initials BC, is a province located on the west coast of Canada. British Columbia is also a component of the Pacific Northwest and the Cascadia bioregion, along with the US states of Idaho, Oregon, Washington and Alaska The province's name was chosen in 1858 by members of the Hudson's Bay Company. In 1871, it became the sixth province of Canada. Its Latin motto is Splendor sine occasu ("Splendour without Diminishment").

The capital of British Columbia is Victoria, the fifteenth-largest metropolitan region in Canada, named for the Queen who created the Colony of British Columbia. The largest city is Vancouver, the third-largest metropolitan area in Canada, the largest in Western Canada, and the second-largest in the Pacific Northwest. In October 2013, British Columbia had an estimated population of 4,606,371 (about 2.5 million of whom were in Greater Vancouver). The province is currently governed by the BC Liberal Party, led by Premier Christy Clark, who became leader as a result of a leadership convention vote on February 26, 2011, and who led her party to an election victory on May 14, 2013.

British Columbia wine

British Columbia wine is Canadian wine produced in the province of British Columbia. Wines made from 100 percent British Columbia grapes can qualify for classification under one of British Columbia's two classification systems, depending on the varietal, the wine-making techniques employed, and various other restrictions.

Originally, the British Columbia Wine Institute handled regulation and marketing of the Vintners Quality Alliance (VQA), which is also an appellation system. More recently, the British Columbia Wine Authority was formed by the provincial government to regulate part of the industry. It created a second classification, "Wines of Distinction", to be also from 100 percent British Columbia grapes, but with less stringent quality control. In practice, it has strengthened the VQA classification.

British Columbia is gaining recognition for its world-class premium VQA wines. Wines which are neither labelled VQA or Wine of Distinction, and from certain producers (given special rights under the 1988 Canada-United States Free Trade Agreement), can use foreign bulk wine to produce a third category of wine which is labelled as Cellared in Canada. Significant parts of the wine industry, and respected wine writers in Canada and abroad, are quite concerned about this practice.

British Columbia (Superintendent of Motor Vehicles) v British Columbia (Council of Human Rights)

British Columbia (Superintendent of Motor Vehicles) v British Columbia (Council of Human Rights), [1999] 3 S.C.R. 868, known as the Grismer Estate case, is a leading Supreme Court of Canada decision on human rights law. The Court held that the British Columbia Superintendent of Motor Vehicles was in violation of the provincial Human Rights Code for cancelling the driver's licence of Terry Grismer because he had a visual disability.

Background

Terry Grismer was a mining truck driver who, after suffering from a stroke in 1984, suffered from homonymous hemianopia (H.H.), a visual disability that reduces the scope of peripheral vision. After the stroke the Superintendent of Motor Vehicles cancelled his driver's licence on the grounds that his condition made him incapable of meeting the minimum standard for peripheral vision required when driving. This rule applied to all people who suffered from H.H.

Stewart, British Columbia

Stewart is a district municipality at the head of the Portland Canal in northwestern British Columbia, Canada. In 2011, its population was about 494.

History

The Nisga'a, who lived around the Nass River, called the head of Portland Canal Skam-A-Kounst, meaning "safe house" or "strong house", probably because it served them as a retreat from the harassment of the Haida and Tlingit from the outer coast. They travelled in the area seasonally to pick berries and hunt birds. It and the rest of the Portland Canal had been the domain of the Tsetsaut people, also called the Skam-a-Kounst Indians, or Jits'aawit in Nisga'a, an Athapaskan people who became decimated by war and disease and were driven out of the Stewart area by either Haida or Nisga'a in 1856-57.

The Portland Canal was first explored and named in July 1793 by Captain George Vancouver in honour of William Henry Cavendish Bentinck, 3rd Duke of Portland (1738-1808), Home Secretary from 1794 to 1801. Vancouver met two friendly native people at the current site of Stewart, BC (Voyage Of Discovery To The North Pacific Ocean, And Round The World In The Years 1791–95, by George Vancouver). The area around the Portland Canal was again explored in 1896 by Captain D.D. Gaillard of the United States Army Corps of Engineers (after whom the Gaillard Cut in the Panama Canal was later named). Two years after Gaillard's visit, the first prospectors and settlers arrived. Among them was D. J. Raine, for whom a creek and a mountain in the area are named. The Stewart brothers arrived in 1902. In 1905, Robert M. Stewart, the first postmaster, named the town Stewart.

British Columbia (disambiguation)

British Columbia is a province of Canada, which has given its name to many associated places and institutions:

Geographic locations

Companies

Educational and scientific institutions

Rail

Politics