B.C. families can choose not to pay their property taxes — at least, temporarily — to help them get through tough economic times, the provincial government announced Tuesday.

In a throne speech that promised everything from tax deferrals to new preschools and a review of B.C. Ferries, Premier Gordon Campbell’s Liberal government laid out a legislative agenda it said would help families by using the Vancouver Olympics, which start Friday, to boost the province’s sagging economic fortunes. But most of the initiatives were short on detail, with ministers responsible telling reporters to “watch for details” in the next few months.

“We are going to be introduced to the world over the next couple of weeks,” said Campbell. “We’re going to use that as a launching pad to the future.”

Families with children under the age of 18, struggling to pay the bills in a slumping economy, will have the option of deferring their property taxes until a future date, the government said.

New neighbourhood preschools for children aged three and four will begin appearing in B.C. communities in the next five years as the province forges new partnerships with the private sector, the throne speech said.

“We have to have those preschools located close to where people live,” Campbell told reporters. “The stories from young families today about travelling at 4 a.m. to be in a lineup for preschool is not smart.”

Meanwhile, all-day kindergarten for five-year-olds begins, in part, this year and will be in place at every school in the province by September 2011, the speech said.

The government will “take a fresh look” at how regulatory bodies such as the B.C. Ferry Commission and B.C. Utilities Commission are doing their jobs, the speech said.

At the same time, the province appeared to single out the quasi-independent B.C. Ferries corporation for “new accountability and transparency” that Campbell said would likely require new legislation. A B.C. Ferries spokeswoman said she had no idea what government was planning.

It’s the latest government shot across B.C. Ferries’ bow. A provincial review last year said ferry executives were being paid too much.

The government throne speech also called for a new Clean Energy Act, protection for the Flathead River Basin in southeast B.C., and a joint provincial-federal environmental approval process to free up billions of dollars worth of building projects Campbell said are caught in bureaucratic red tape.

Many of the promises came with limited details. A pledge to work with municipalities to “dramatically reduce housing costs for young families” offered no specifics.

With statements such as “invest record amounts in public transit,” the address contained little of the dour tone of last August’s throne speech. Then, the government warned the “fiscal cupboard is bare and currently hangs on a wall of deficit spending.”

In fact, the throne speech yesterday made little to no mention of the $2.8-billion deficit this year and plans to run deficits for the next four years.

Opposition NDP Leader Carole James said she’d expected the government to at least acknowledge the economic challenges, child poverty and high unemployment rates that plague B.C.

“I saw a government that didn’t have any ideas to deal with things post-Olympics,” she said.

James said she believes the speech foreshadows a flurry of tough cuts in the next provincial budget, March 2.

rfshaw@tc.canwest.com

kwestad@tc.canwest.com

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Highlights from the throne speech:

-- Partner with private businesses to create neighbourhood daycares over the next five years.

-- Begin shutting down B.C. Rail.

-- Examine B.C.’s regulatory commissions, such as the B.C. Ferry Commission, TransLink Commission and B.C. Utilities Commission.

-- Create a new Clean Energy Act to encourage independent power production.

-- Encourage infrastructure partnerships involving green transportation such as electric or hydrogen-powered vehicles, as well as vehicles powered by compressed natural gas and liquid natural gas.

-- Partner with Montana to preserve the Flathead River Basin in southeastern B.C. by banning mining, oil and gas development.

-- Establish a joint committee on municipal tax reform.

-- Invest “record amounts” in public transit.

-- Allow universities to remove themselves from the government reporting entity.

-- Create a new Extended Family Program to modernize the Child in the Home of a Relative program.

-- Make “significant changes” to combat crime and reduce impaired and dangerous driving.