British Columbia politicians are doing due diligence on all the big headline stories, but there’s one issue that seems to have them transfixed. It’s the innocuous wording change in the Motor Vehicle Act that re-emphasizes the “keep right except to pass” law on highways.

Transportation Minister Todd Stone says it’s getting an inordinate amount of interest from the public as well, which is why a lot of MLAs have latched onto the change.

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The keep-right-except-to-pass law has been on the books forever. The signs to that effect have been up for as long.

(When I was a kid, I thought that was the name of the next town.)

The signs, in fact, have been up for so long, it seems people stopped paying attention to them. They were redesigned last year to make them more emphatic, and an amendment to the law was introduced reinforcing the idea.

It’s just a wording change, but from the amount of time spent in the legislature on the change, you’d think B.C. was reversing the flow of traffic. In all the verbiage, there’s a startling new revelation about the national identity. The standard understanding of the Canadian identity is that we’re perceived as nice, polite but boring.

But various legislators have revealed another disturbing facet: We’re notorious in the U.S. for being left-lane hogs.

NDP MLA Mike Farnworth laid out Canada’s shame for all to see this week.

“Unfortunately, far too often, when you to talk to police in the U.S., they will tell you that far and away the largest group of people they ticket for not obeying the rules of the road … stay in the right-hand lane and use the left lane for passing — are Canadians, and in particular, British Columbians.”

Others have echoed that view, including Stone, who said U.S. highway patrols find it’s a fact of life.

Farnworth said too many people think the left lane is their own personal space.

He paraphrased the average left-lane hog’s reasoning: “I’m doing the speed limit. It’s people behind me backed up who should be observing the speed limit. I’m not breaking the law and they are, so I’m going to stay in the left lane.”

He condemned the practice, as did Stone earlier. “Left-lane hogs seem to think it’s their lot in life to drive that left lane and impede the flow of traffic,” said Farnworth. He said it creates frustration and has cost lives.

A number of speeches seem to involve a certain amount of personal venting by politicians with first-hand experience being blocked in the left lane.

Farnworth was almost sputtering in indignation. “You see them. They’re not moving. It doesn’t matter that they’re causing problems … You know what? There are rules of the road.”

The general view is that left-lane hogging is the kind of passive-aggressive attitude that leads to road rage and the complete breakdown of social order.

NDP MLA Nick Simons backed the crackdown. “I don’t make citizen’s arrests for people, but I do give dirty looks out my driver’s side, I have to say.” (He admitted to learning how to drive in Montreal.)

MLA Andrew Weaver weighed in for the Green party with the belief that the scourge began in Victoria, specifically, on the highway to the ferries.

“I think left-lane driving started in Victoria and, despite this legislation, will never change here in the capital regional district,” said Weaver.

The law essentially confirms that on multi-lane highways with a speed limit of 80 km/h or higher and the actual speed is at least 50 km/h, drivers can only use the left lane in certain situations (passing, allowing merges, preparing for a left turn, or passing an official vehicle on the side of the road).

It got unanimous support, with one political observation. The Opposition noted all the attention on left-lane hogs shows there’s not much else going on. The highlight of the throne speech was a new citizenship medal. The 26 bills in the legislative package have hardly any highlights at all.

So when it comes to bills, there’s not much else to talk about.

lleyne@timescolonist.com