If Chong’s Reform Act were in place in BC, would Adrian Dix be Premier today?

Lots of the debate around Michael Chong’s proposed Reform Act to, among other things, allow a federal parliamentary caucus to fire the party leader, has taken place in the abstract. We need to do something, it’s better than nothing, you're with reform or you're with the terrorists, and so forth. Let’s take it into the real world though. If Chong’s legislation was in place in British Columbia, who would be Premier today: Christy Clark, the NDP's Adrian Dix, or some other BC Liberal?

That’s the question I found myself mulling in a Courtenay, BC Dairy Queen over Christmas, as I read the Times Colonist’s year-end interview with Clark while enjoying a chicken strip basket. While Clark is now triumphantly in the driver’s seat after an unexpected majority victory in last year’s election, her pre-election position was tenuous at best.

She won the leadership in 2011 on the third ballot with 52 per cent of the vote over Kevin Falcon. While she may have enjoyed a measure of support from BC Liberal party membership, she inherited a decidedly skeptical caucus from Gordon Campbell – just one sitting MLA had supported her leadership campaign, and he wasn’t exactly one of the heavyweights.

Clark was very limited in her freedom of movement as Premier, with a caucus that hadn’t supported her, was skeptical of her political acumen after a stint on the sidelines in talk radio, and didn’t think she could lead them to re-election. Losing caucus support was constantly a very real concern, and reports of caucus rumbling and possible revolt were frequent.

She hints at the difficulty of the situation in the Times Colonist piece:

Beset by a cantankerous cast of Liberal MLAs, some of whom worked to undermine her leadership, Clark started the year struggling to pass her spring legislation.

One of her most trusted lieutenants was forced to resign in an ethnic outreach scandal, and Clark seemed dogged by several months of bad news, apologies and barely concealed infighting.

“It’s like you are lost in the woods and you get up and you think, ‘OK, the only way I’m going to get to where I need to go is by walking. I’m not exactly sure I’m going in the right direction, but I am going to keep moving, damn it.’ So there were a few days like that.”

Half the caucus wasn’t convinced she had the right plan to win the May provincial election, Clark now admits.

“There were some days I was being pretty publicly attacked by our own caucus members,” she said.

“Some of them seemed to want to get rid of me more than they wanted to get rid of the NDP. That’s not easy to deal with.”

We know how the story ended, of course. She put together a team and strategy, recruited new candidates, called an election, ran a strong, aggressive campaign, benefited from a shaky NDP performance, and won a majority that surprised the hell out of nearly everybody.

However, what if Chong’s Reform Act had been in place in BC, and that restless BC Liberal caucus had the ability to a) trigger a caucus vote on her leadership with 15 per cent signing a petition b) fire her with a majority vote? How would the story have played out then?

Given the restlessness within that caucus – focused on their own re-election concerns and having wanted someone else for leader -- there’s a very good chance it would have gotten cold feet at some point between her February 2011 election as leader and the May 2013 election, I’d put the odds at better than even that they’d have fired Clark and put someone else up as leader. Even putting it to a vote in the first place – the 15 per cent threshold would have been laughably easy to meet – would have undoubtedly leaked, and would likely have been fatal to her premiership.

As it turns out, while the caucus Clark inherited from Campbell may have had its doubts about her, British Columbians obviously felt otherwise, giving her a strengthened majority. And her vision and campaign style was key to that victory. How would the election have gone if the Campbell caucus had replaced her with someone more to their liking? We’ll never know, but with where the polls were going in, it could well have been the NDP’s Dix doing those year-end interviews.

To bring it back around to Chong’s Reform Act, I think what this shows is that caucus doesn’t always know best. The caucus perspective tends to be insular, and focused on things that don’t necessarily mirror the concerns of the public – will I get re-elected, who will give me a cabinet or critic portfolio. Party leaders are elected by a broader constituency with a broader perspective – party members – and that’s a positive thing. Would it have been democratic for the caucus to fire the leader elected by party members? In hindsight, it certainly would have been electorally foolish.

When they elected Clark as leader, party members obviously saw something different on the ground than most of the caucus saw from Victoria, and that was vindicated in last May’s election in a big way.

So let’s be careful before we jump into bed with the first piece of parliamentary reform that comes along, and instead consider how it’s likely to play out in the real world. Because we may not like how it would.

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NDP says Liberals are hiding Christy, but where's their Dix?

There's an election happening on the left coast, and for all the preoccupation last year about the BC Conservatives, it's quickly shaping up as a choice between Christy Clark's BC Liberals and Adrian Dix's BC NDP.

Heck, even BC Conservative leader John Cummins admitted to reporters that, in the last election, he was unhappy with his incumbent and instead cast a protest vote for the BC NDP candidate. Apparently he didn't even consider voting for the candidate of the party he now leads. So I'm not sure why anyone else would either.

Anyway, apparently the NDP have been making hay with a claim that the Liberals have been hiding Clark in their campaign material, and a Tumblr has been created with alleged examples. Fairly common campaign stuff, but usually you don't throw this rock when you're sheltering in a glass house.

Because another Tumblr has popped-up, and hey, where's Dix?

Apparently 90 per cent of NDP campaign web sites and signs also contain no mention of their leader. That has to be embarrassing. Why are they hiding Dix? And why doth they protest so muchly?

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Christy Clark knows when things are a trap

There's an election underway in British Columbia, and Christy Clark's BC Liberals have launched their first campaign spot:


I suppose it could be a coincidence, but I think someone on the campaign has a sense of humour, as "it's a trap" has become a phrase associated with Admiral Ackbar of Star Wars fame.

Perhaps they didn't have the rights, but I've recut the ad the way it should have been produced:


Trust them when they say NDP economic policies are risky, because Christy Clark and Admiral Ackbar know when things are a trap.

And while the polls may look tough for Clark, and the victory of Darth Dix and the NDP death star may seem assured, Clark used to shoot womprats with her T16 back home, and they're not much bigger than two metres.

So don't count her out.

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Some positive messaging from Christy Clark in BC – but that name change…

I wrote earlier this week about some lessons I hoped BC Liberal Premier Christy Clark would take from the experience of Alberta PCPremier Alison Redford, who was able to win election and beat back a threat on her right by moving to the centre and appealing to progressive voters. And I expressed my frustration with Clark ignoring the left flank of the “coalition” while lunging to embrace the right.

So I was pleased to read comments Clark made to reporters this week in Victoria, in reaction to the Alberta election results:

“The lesson, for me, is that people want a strong coalition,” Ms. Clark told reporters in Victoria on Tuesday. “In British Columbia, the recipe for success is to make sure we have a strong thriving economy and the reason we want that is so that we can make sure people can put food on the table for their kids and look after the most vulnerable in society.”

“The thing for us, in our coalition, is to speak to all the members of our coalition,” she said. “I’ve done a lot of things that have made conservatives happy, and a lot of things that have made people at the centre, liberals, happy, I hope.”

As the Globe said, Clark’s remarks were a “tacit acknowledgment that her efforts to win back supporters from the B.C. Conservatives has left more centrist, liberal voters cold.” I’m pleased that, at least, there is awareness of the problem, and I welcome a shift in message emphasis. It needs to be followed-up, though with concrete action. Clark mentioned raising the minimum wage and the promised family day holiday as examples, but both are rather old. She’ll need to marry words with action to win the centre. 

And I think the way forward is in the same focus that won her the leadership: helping B.C. families be happy, healthy and successful. Most people don’t think about left, right or centre. They think about their families, and their daily lives. Speak to them with real, moderate solutions to their problems and you’ll do well.

About that name…

In related news, I was less pleased about these comments from Clark:

Premier Christy Clark says she's open to a name change if it can be done in time, as part of her appeal to unite the centre-right vote in B.C.

"(Former Liberal finance minister) Colin Hansen raised it at the last provincial convention, and I said at the time I was more than willing to entertain the idea, and so we've been talking. One of our vice presidents has travelled the province and talked to members all across the province about it, so we're working on it and I'll let you know when I have some new news."

In a neutral context, I’d be all for a name change for a number of reasons. For one, the name hasn’t really been representative of the party since the Socreds took it over in the 1990s. And for two, as a federal Liberal it would save us so much drama.

But here’s the thing: we’re not considering this in a neutral context. We’re considering it in the context of a sustained lurch by the party to the right and an alienated left flank. To stuff your office with Harperites, actively court the right, and then dump the word Liberal from the name would be a pretty big middle-finger to the l/Liberals in your camp looking for a reason to stay.

It’s the right idea, but I’m not sure the timing could be worse. For one, it reeks of desperation at this point. If they do it, I hope they accompany it with some major outreach to the left flank of the party to make clear this isn’t the final move in pushing them out the door.

The other risk is that it feeds the negative conceptions that many may be harboring about the party, and the government. The left says it proves they’re not very liberal. The right says you can change the name but Clark is still a liberal. And those dissatisfied with the Campbell years say they’re trying to pretend they’re a new party but I remember their record, and I’ll show them they can’t hide.

Just after she won the leadership, maybe. But in the current context, I just don’t know. But I think actions would and need to speak louder than names at this point.

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A new premier and a new dynamic in British Columbia

A big win last night on the left coast for Christy Clark, who scored a third-ballot victory in the BC Liberal Party race over Kevin Falcon and managed to get her victory speech in before the Canucks game started. Unfortunately the Canucks would fall to the Boston Bruins, but otherwise a pretty good night for British Columbia.

It was interesting watching the evening unfold from afar, as the media tried to figure out how to cover a (weighted) one member, one vote non-convention as opposed to the old-style made for tv delegated drama. The members voted across the province throughout the day Saturday online and on the phone with a single preferential ballot. More democratic than a delegated convention, but less for the media to do.

The party did try to squeeze what drama it could out of the system. Rather than just announce the winner straight-out, it announced the results of each ballot in 10-minute increments. Surprising the final result didn't leak to Twitter early. I thought it was a little surprising George Abbott didn't do better on the first ballot, but him and Kevin Falcon were fishing in the same pool. Not surprised Clark wasn't higher on the first ballot, everyone was trying to spin-up her numbers as part of the expectations game. What was surprising was that the rumours of Clark's lack of second-choice support were shown false. There was no anybody but Christy movement; Clark gained steadily as Mike DeJong and Abbott fell off the ballot.

As a BCer at heart, I'm optimistic about Clark's victory.When I was still living in BC I let my BC Liberal membership lapse, disappointed that the Liberal/Conservative coalition (out there it's not a dirty word) had tilted much too right for my liking as the Campbell government went on. I'm hopeful that Clark can move the party and the government back toward the progressive centre. Time will tell, of course, but I'm hopeful.

The challenge, of course, will be holding that coalition together. Clark is seen by many as a "Liberal" candidate, viewed with wariness by some on the "Conservative" side of the party. There were abandon the party warnings by some if she won, and the upstart BC Conservative Party is waiting in the wings. I suspect many of the warnings were just electioneering, but the BC Conservative leadership race will be worth watching.

The other challenge for Clark will be uniting a caucus that, with one exception, supported other people. This, I think, will be less of a challenge than it has been hyped to be. It's one team now, and with the NDP soon to have a new leader, everyone knows where the focus should be.

Oh, and of course, Clark needs to find a riding to run in and get herself into the legislature.

So we'll now watch to see how Clark builds her cabinet and begins governing, while the NDP (and the BC Conservatives) continue their leadership races. Once we know all the players, and get a sense of how Clark will be governing (and how the HST referendum goes) we'll have a better sense of what the future holds. But always interesting times on the left coast.

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B.C. leadership round-up: Dana Larsen vs NDP bosses, and a Falcon flip-flop?

While the rest of Canada may have slowed-down for the Christmas break, with two leadership races underway on the left coast the wackiness continued as per usual in Supernatural British Columbia.

The BC NDP

* We’ll start with the BC NDP, and the slow to start race to replace Carole James. With potential candidates slow to surface, we finally had someone step forward and put their name into the race over the break, and it’s a familiar name: rabble-rousing marijuana crusader Dana Larsen.

Former West Vancouver-Sunshine Coast federal NDP candidate and marijuana advocate Dana Larsen announced Wednesday that he will run for the leadership of the B.C. New Democrats.

Larsen said he had no plans of pursuing a leadership role until Carole James stepped down from the position in early December, but said he decided to throw his hat in the ring because he wanted to offer "a fresh perspective" to party members and the B.C. electorate.

In an interview with The Outlook, Larsen said he hopes to take the B.C. NDP back to "grassroots" politics and re-establish the party as "unabashedly left wing." Renewed support for low-income and seniors' housing, he said, are two issues at the top of his agenda.

As Troy McClure would say, you may remember Dana Larsen from past scandals was forced to resign as a federal candidate over video of himself driving a car while high on LSD (actually, see update below), or banned from the NDP convention in Halifax by Brad Lavigne.

Yes, we first came to know Larsen as the NDP candidate in West Vancouver-Sunshine Coast-Really Long Riding Name in the 2008 federal election. Larsen was the first of three NDP candidates to drop out of the race in BC after YouTube video surfaced of Larsen “dropping hallucinogenic drugs and driving while smoking marijuana.”

He resurfaced the next year in the lead-up to the NDP’s 2009 federal convention in Halifax, when he offered financial assistance to potential delegates as part of his campign to pass pro-legalization policy at convention. NDP executive director Brad Lavigne viewed this as improper lobbying and had him banned from the convention hall on conference eve, creating somewhat of a martyr.

It seems Larsen still doesn’t have many friends in the NDP leadership. While Larsen wants to run for the BC leadership, BC NDP boss Moe Sihota is throwing cold-water on the prospect:

But NDP provincial secretary Moe Sihota said Larsen was declared ineligible to run for the party after the 2008 federal election campaign when he had to step down as a candidate in a Vancouver-area riding after videos appeared of him smoking pot and taking LSD.

Sihota also counted Larsen out on a technicality, which he said ultimately could prevent Larsen from running provincially at all.

"He's not a member of the party," said Sihota. "He was already deemed ineligible to run for the party federally and the rules committee, which meets on Jan. 6, would have to decide whether he would be able to run provincially."

It appears some of the confusion may have been addressed, and Larsen does indeed now have a membership, although he says he had, or should have, had one all along. I was interested to read Sihota’s characterization of Larsen’s departure from the 2008 race though. Sihota said Larsen “was deemed ineligible to run for the party federally” but the news coverage at the time made clear Larsen wasn’t forced-out but stepped aside voluntarily:

Asked about Mr. Larsen’s resignation Wednesday evening in Toronto, NDP Leader Jack Layton said he didn’t know why the party hadn’t done checks to find out about some of the candidate’s activities, which are posted on the Internet. He said the candidate submitted the resignation to the B.C. campaign team and that it was accepted.

“I don’t know a lot of the details of what’s gone on there, but he’s obviously taken the decision that he’s not a suitable candidate, and we’ve accepted that decision.”

* It could all be moot anyway, barring gender-reassignment surgery. Because it appears an arcane part of the BC NDP’s constitution requires the next leader to be female:

The next leader of the B.C. NDP will have to be a woman, unless the party's male president or treasurer resigns, according to gender rules in the NDP constitution.

The unique requirement, buried within the NDP's official rulebook, adds an extra layer of complexity in the race to replace leader Carole James.

The constitution states both genders must be represented in the jobs of leader, president and treasurer.

The current president is Moe Sihota and the treasurer is Bob Smits. James is stepping down later this month, and all those who have publicly said they are considering the job are men.

This is yet another example of why I think hard quotas are a clumsy way of achieving demographic parity, and are generally a bad idea. I might add that the BC Liberals didn’t need quotas to attract two quality female candidates in Moira Stilwell and the frontrunner, Christy Clark.

BC Liberals

*Over in BC Liberal land, meanwhile, we may have our first flip-flop of the campaign, on the proposal floated a few weeks back to lower the voting age to 16. When Mike de Jong first floated the idea, and Christy Clark quickly expressed support, Kevin Falcon did as well, in a statement that’s still on his Web site:

“Lowering the voting age to 16 is an interesting idea. One I am inclined to support, in conjunction with mandatory civics courses as a part of the high school curriculum. I should add that I am proud to be a member of a party that allows 14 year olds to become full members and commence their engagement as citizens before they get to vote.

“We need to recognize however, that lowering the voting age will not solve all the problems of lack of engagement with citizens. As it is, voter turn-out is unacceptably low in BC. What I am interested in is hearing from people about what we can do collectively to make sure that more people are encouraged to exercise their vote.”

However, just a week later, in a Dec. 21 interview with Harjinder Thind on Red FM, Flacon appeared to back away from that position:

Harjinder Thind: Are you in favour of increasing the minimum wage, or, decreasing the voting age?

Kevin Falcon: I am not in favour of decreasing the voting age because I think that we already are having trouble getting 18 to 24 year olds voting. But, I am interested in reaching out to those young people the way I have done through my leadership campaign by using social media and by using our website and Flicker and facebook and Twitter to connect with young people and we're doing that very successfully.

I hope Falcon will explain his apparent 180 on this issue. And I have to say, reaching out to the kids on the Twitter is nice, but if the message you’re tweeting is I don’t think you should have the vote, you’re missing the point.

*Back to gender, Keith Baldrey analyzes recent polling data and shows a strong shift of the female vote away from the BC NDP to the BC Liberals:

The NDP has long prided itself as a champion of the interests of women, and it even implemented an affirmative action policy to ensure more female candidates in the last election. But it is now seen as the party that undemocratically turfed a female leader, and it will undoubtedly elect a man to succeed Carole James.

In fact, it will be interesting to see if any women even run for the NDP leadership. If none do, it will be a stunning commentary about the party's true commitment to the interests of women.

Meanwhile, the B.C. Liberals couldn't be happier about this. The polls show the NDP's loss in support from women is in the double-digits, as many have gone over to the B.C. Liberals.

*Lastly, Christy Clark is talking about putting families first:

UPDATE: In an e-mail, Larsen clarifies that he did not drive while under the influence of LSD. There is a video of him taking LSD, and a separate video of him driving with an unlit joint. Media coverage indicates the driving video was while under the influence of DMT (dimethyltryptamine), but he says it had worn off before he drove. Says Larsen:

"Despite the media hype, in the two videos in question I am shown to be a responsible user of psychedelics. I do regret the brief segment which shows me driving with an unlit joint in my hand. I advocate for responsible use and don't support driving impaired."

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Can Christy Clark move BC past the HST?

To most that follow British Columbia politics from afar, myself included, it’s more than a little surprising that, with all the drama over the last year or two, the BC Liberals stand a more than decent chance of winning the next election.

There is one big caveat though: the BC Liberals need to get out from under and away from the Harmonized Sales Tax (HST). When she launched her campaign for the BC Liberal leadership last week, Christy Clark presented one scenario that would seem to offer the party the chance to do just that:

“Let us consider putting the proposed referendum question to a truly free vote of the Legislative Assembly. And you know how that question goes: that this house is in favour of extinguishing the harmonized sales tax. Now if this process is successful it would put the HST behind us by March 31st. If it’s successful, we would notify the federal government immediately of our intention to withdraw after the 18 months notice that’s required in the agreement. We would start to negotiate with them to get out earlier than the five-year agreement currently allows. And unfortunately, it would mean going back to the GST and the PST. But we won’t revisit the HST for another five years. It is time for British Columbia to have certainty around this question.”

“After almost a year, the public still hates the HST. And I think we need to face some hard realities here. And that is if this goes to a referendum, a real referendum, the HST will almost certainly fail. We need to take our heads out of the sand on that, and we need to get on with restoring our economy. No one is served by uncertainty.”

Personally, I think sales tax harmonization makes good economic sense and good policy sense. The devil is in the details, and you need to do everything you can to ensure it’s as close to cost-neutral as possible for taxpayers, but it makes sense on all kinds of levels. Less paperwork for businesses, less paperwork for government. And I think undoing it will be a major logistical and procedural headache.

In BC, though, the implementation was clearly bungled. After telling the public harmonization wasn’t on the agenda during the election campaign, just days later suddenly plans to harmonize were announced. It reeked of dishonesty. While it belatedly began to try to sell the public on the merits of the HST, it was never able to get over that initial perception of dishonesty.

In any democracy, you must listen to the will of the citizens, and the people of B.C. seem clear that the HST has got to go. The government has lost the battle on this one, and it’s time to move on. Prolonging this process through the referendum next fall would be pointless, and would only prolong the economic uncertainty while seeing time and resources wasted fighting a lost cause.

Clark hasn’t committed to a course of action on the HST – she plans to consult party members and the public in the weeks ahead – but her outlined option seems the best way to move the province forward and allow it to put the HST behind it. If the legislature votes to kill the HST the referendum becomes unnecessary and the process of unwinding the tax can begin.

I do have one big question though, and that’s what of the $1.6 billion in transition funding that the federal government sent to the province to sweeten the deal? It seems safe to assume the feds are going to want that money back; just saying “keep it” would hardly be fair to the other provinces. I doubt the feds would take a super hard line and demand it all back at once; this would be part of the negotiation but I could see it being paid back over time or applied over time against future transfer payments. Still, it’s going to but a crunch on the province’s budget and necessitate some tough choices that need to be part of the debate.

Anyway, here’s the video from Clark’s leadership campaign launch last week:

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Seems Christy Clark will launch BC Liberal leadership run this morning

A few quality candidates are already in the race to replace Gordon Campbell as the next leader of the B.C. Liberal Party (I hear good things about Kevin Falcon), but I'm excited to see that it appears likely former education minister and deputy Premier Christy Clark will throw her hat in the ring this morning.

She's making an announcement this morning in Vancouver at SFU's Segal School of Business, 500 Granville at Pender. It's open to all with doors opening at 8am and the announcement at 8:30am PDT. If you can't make it in person, you can also watch the live stream online at her Web site.

I've supported the BC Liberals in the past, but I felt they drifted too far to the right over the years for my comfort, and in the last election I was in B.C. for I actually, reluctantly, voted NDP. I think the BC Liberals need to return to their moderate, centrist, progressive roots, and I'm hopeful Christy could be the candidate to make that happen, and bring progressives like me back into the fold.

I'm looking forward to hearing what Christy, Kevin and the other candidates have to say on the issues in what should be a very interesting race. Two races actually, with Carole James' resignation this week as BC NDP leader. They have some challenging issues to deal with.

The B.C. political landscape is about to undergo a major shake-up. One thing is more sure; B.C. politics are never dull!

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Campbell’s departure could dash NDP dreams

I've lived in Ontario for five years now but I’ve never really gotten involved in provincial politics here. I think it’s because, having come from the always entertaining and wacky world of BC politics, Ontario seems pretty dull by comparison. Certainly watching the HST drama from afar has been far more interesting than some supposed drama about Dalton McGuinty and hydro rates or something.

It’s hard to know where to start. Arguably the most electorally successful premier in BC history in Gordon Campbell, who survived a drunk-driving charge while in office, only to be felled by a caucus and taxpayer revolt. A taxpayer revolt led by Bill Vander Zalm, a former premier who presided over the destruction of the once-mighty Social Credit brand and left office in disgrace and mockery. And an opposition party in the BC NDP that, with the government at historic lows in the polls, seemed more interested in knifing its own leader, Carole James.

The latest development, Campbell’s resignation as Premier, was both inevitable and surprising. He tried to save himself with a televised infomercial a few weeks ago, offering large personal tax cuts, but the damage was done. With a caucus revolt brewing, Campbell recognized the writing was on the wall and decided to go as gracefully as possible.

Campbell’s departure triggers what should be a pretty interesting leadership race to replace him with all kinds of names being thrown out, from current minister like Kevin Falcon to past ministers like Christy Clark, as well as popular mayors and even federal Conservative cabinet ministers like James Moore.

Surprisingly, polling shows that, unlike when Rita Johnston beat-out Grace McCarthy for the Socred leadership after Vander Zalm ran the party into the ground, the BC Liberal leadership may still be a prize worth winning.

If Campbell had stubbornly decided to stay on the BC Liberal brand seemed destined to join Social Credit in the political graveyard, its support splitting between the BC Conservatives, the BC NDP and possibly a new centrist alternative. That erosion could still happen at a slower pace, but by falling on his sword Campbell has given his party a chance to live on.

New polling from Angus Reid taken after his televised infomercial but before his resignation indicates Campbell’s last-ditch hail-mary didn’t land, but he stands a good chance taking a lot of the voter animosity with him when he leaves the legislature.

The NDP still has a strong lead in the horserace, 47 per cent to 26 per cent over the BC Liberals, with the Greens and Conservatives tied at 10 per cent. And if the HST referendum goes ahead, 66 per cent will vote to abolish, 21 per cent would keep and 13 per cent are undecided.

The poll shows while they liked the policy promises in Campbell’s infomercial they’ve completely lost faith that he’ll keep his word on anything, with 66 per cent calling him unconvincing.

There is, however, a lot of underlying weakness evident in the NDP numbers. While Campbell scores an anemic 12 per cent leadership approval rating, James isn’t a whole lot better at 25 per cent.

And here’s an interesting set of numbers. While only six per cent said they’d like to see the next election return a BC Liberal government led by Campbell, remove Campbell from the equation and the NDP lead is only preferred 32 per cent to 28 per cent.

While the level of remaining resilience in the BC Liberal brand is surprising, the NDP weakness isn’t. Their numbers are very soft. For many years BC has been a two-party system, swinging back and forth between two defaults. People are pissed off with Campbell’s Liberals and James and the NDP are the default choice, but she’s still the leader and the party the electorate soundly rejected in the last election.

With a new leader at the helm of the BC Liberals and a few years to govern before the next election, that 47 to 22 NDP lead will shrink and this could be a very tight race once more. It will depend, of course, on who the new leader is and, more importantly, what they do with the HST. While the HST is the right policy, the people seem to have spoken pretty clearly and the referendum seems a formality at this point. If a new leader reverses the HST it's a new ball-game. If they try to sell it in a referendum battle, it will be closer but I don’t see them pulling it out.

Finally, even if a new leader can bring the BC Liberals off of life support, it remains clear that British Columbians remain utterly unsatisfied with their status quo options. While 32 per cent want the NDP to former the next government and 28 per cent the Campbell-less Liberals, the leader, with 34 per cent, as not sure/none of these.

Campbell’s departure may slow the process, but another dramatic shake-up of the BC political landscape remains inevitable. And it’s still very much needed.

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HST Powerplay: Bill Vander Zalm vs. Carole James?

I don't mean to keep writing on the HST -- not when there's Chinese spies to identify, and early reviews of the fake lake to discuss -- but Vaughn Palmer has some interesting news about the anti-HST fight in B.C. this morning that should be shared with you.

The bulk of his piece today is about how the anti-HST forces, led by Vander Zalm, have apparently taken embattled BC Premier Gordon Campbell off their target list for a recall initiative. Could be because they couldn't pull it off in Point Grey, with it's combination of transient students and well-off yuppies, or it could be because they think Gordo will give up the leadership soon enough anyways, so why waste the effort.

Speaking of giving-up the leadership, what's interesting is the battle for control of the anti-HST crusade that may be brewing between the ex-Socred Vander Zalm (who ideologically certaintly has more in common with the conservative BC Libs than the NDP) and the BC NDP, led by Carole James.

While James has been content to let the Zalm take the lead during the referendum petition drive, as the campaign shifts into a recall strategy targeting government MLAs in a bid to pressure the government to pass legislation to kill the HST rather than hold a referendum, cracks are forming. Palmer reports while Vander Zalm favours a drip-drip strategy to pressure Campbell to act without topping the government, James and the NDP want wide-spread recall to topple the government and put themselves into power.

Reports Palmer:

I've heard predictions from New Democrats that they will recall the Liberals in numbers sufficient to deprive the government of its majority in the legislature, and force an immediate election, clearing the way for an NDP government by this time next year.

Some say that they will also move Vander Zalm aside and take control of the anti-HST movement, once the current petition campaign is over.

This is interesting, and such cracks were inevitable. He doesn't like the HST, but an old Socred war-horse like Vander Zalm sure doesn't want to help usher-in an NDP government either. And for the NDP, it's less about the HST than it is about unseating Campbell and claiming power. While their interests coincided for a time, they're beginning to diverge.

What will be interesting to see is if James can so easily push Vander Zalm aside and take control of the anti-HST crusade. Even if the Zalm were to agree to go quietly, I have my doubts. The success of the movement in BC has been, in part, because it hasn't been closely aligned to one party. There isn't much love out there for the BC NDP either, or for James. They're polling well now because the public is pissed with Campbell, and James is the default choice. For many, it's about pressuring the government to kill the HST, not changing the government.

I can see why the NDP might be in a hurry. With fixed election dates, the next election in BC isn't scheduled until May 2013. There's a risk the HST anger could have subsided by then, particularly if Campbell resigns in favour of a new leader that can turn the page on this. If they want to capitalize on this, wide-scale recall (the BC Libs have a 5-member cushion) to overturn the government may be their best bet. The risk, though, is the air coming out of the HST balloon if people are faced with the prospect of an NDP government.

P.S. Congratulations to the Nova Scotia Liberals for their decisive wins in two by-elections last night. They managed to pull off the win even without Jack Layton campaigning against the Nova Scotia NDP government's decision to raise the province's HST to the highest level in Canada. I'm sure Jack will bring his anti-HST campaign to Nova Scotia real soon, though, and not just Ontario and BC.

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The HST affair showcases all that’s wrong with politics today

If you’re looking for a case-study for all that’s wrong with modern politics in this country, one issue that is a microcosm of all the practices, methods and tends contributing to the degradation of political debate in Canada, then you can’t do any better than the “debate” around the Harmonized Sales Tax (HST).

At the federal level, you’ve got the Conservatives who have sent billions of dollars to Ontario and B.C. to sweeten the deal encouraging them to harmonize, while their backbenchers insist no, that’s a provincial thing, nothing to do with us, we think it sucks. You’ve got the Liberals who pushed harmonization in government and don’t want to piss-off their cousins in Ontario but, at the same time, would dearly love to capitalize on the populist anti-HST feeling, result: a muddied position that pleases few. Luckily the NDP aren’t troubled by ideological consistency, the party that never met a tax it didn’t like will oppose this one in Ontario and B.C. for pure politics, while ignoring that the Nova Scotia NDP government just jacked-up their HST to the highest level in Canada. And the BQ say we’re cool with the HST, just as long as you give a few billion to Quebec because they made changes to their tax system that aren’t really the same but, hey, give us money.

Then there’s the provincial level. In Ontario, you’ve got the McGuinty Liberals only seeming to start to get serious about selling this thing to the public and counter-acting some of the hysteria out there. You’ve got Tim Hudak’s Conservatives breaking with their federal cousins to oppose the HST, even though they can’t seem to articulate why it’s bad policy and won’t even promise to repeal it if elected. And then there’s the Ontario NDP, blind in their opposition and happy to distort and misinform.

Out in BC, Gordon Campbell’s Conservaliberals are facing more public outcry because they seemed to rule out harmonization during the last election, then announced they were harmonizing mere days after the ballots were cast. They thought they could ride-out the storm but are now waking-up to some serious trouble. Former Socred Bill Vander Zalm, of all people, who left the premiership in disgrace, is leading a popular revolt against the tax, with the support of the BC NDP (strange bedfellows) that could lead to a referendum to repeal the HST there. But Vander Zalm and the BC NDP (unlike their Ontario cousins, they could actually form government so they need to face a few more serious questions) don’t seem willing to address how this would happen: how would you revert the tax system back, and how about the billion dollars in harmonization funding the feds will want back. Which hospitals will you close to find that money? They just want you angry, they don't want you thinking.

Instead of a debate of facts around the HST, we’ve been treated to mass hysteria. It’s like the ugly baby with no parents. The federal government doesn’t want it. Ontario has been low-key about selling it; B.C. even more so. And the opposition parties have all been more interested in stoking populist fervor to paint this as a tax hike instead of opposing on policy grounds, and proposing reforms or alternatives, or just what they'd do differently. Or even how they'd repeal it, and what that would mean.

Myself, I think the timing was bad (and in BC, it was handled stupidly) but sales tax harmonization is good policy. It’s more efficient, and will save government and business money. Value-added taxes are just more efficient than taxes on production, or on income. Some items will cost more for consumers in the short-term, but it will net-out in the long-run as savings are passed on, investments are made and new jobs are created. This has been the case in every other jurisdiction in Canada where the HST has been implemented. I think there is room for tinkering and adjustment, but overall it’s good policy that should be supported.

There’s plenty of room to debate that, I just wish the debate would be on the facts and on the policy, not on hysteria. To that end, I found this list from the Ontario government on specific items and how their tax treatment will change (or not) to be interesting. They’ve also put out information on how it will impact people, and impact businesses.

We've all been ill-served by all our politicians in this affair. Partly, it's our own fault. I think most people that sit down and consider it objectively will support harmonization. But, knowing most of us can't be bothered or just don't have the time, we're pandered to with sound bites and simplistic arguments that don't do this debate justice. Unless we demand better, we can only blame ourselves for the result.

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BC is hungry for an alternative

I haven’t been active at all in provincial politics since I moved to Ontario nearly five years ago. Naturally, I’m inclined to support the McGuinty Liberals (some issue by issue disagreements with them aside) but I’ve neither joined (except briefly before the last election) nor volunteered for the party, and haven’t blogged much on provincial issues either.

Could be that I have my hands full following the minority madness in Ottawa, but I also think it’s because I was spoiled growing-up in British Columbia, where provincial politics is more than a little crazy, and always entertaining (even if Campbell tried hard to make it boring again.)

From the craziness of the Vander Zalm Socreds with scandals such as the Fantasy Gardens affair, to Bingogate under the NDP’s Mike Harcourt and all the drama about Glen Clark’s deck and the fast cat ferry fiasco (alliteration is key to a good scandal), to Gordon Campbell’s Hawaiian DUI, the legislature raids and now the return of Vander Zalm and the HST drama – BC politics is never boring.

It has, however, become increasingly polarized over the years, and that has left many – myself included – unimpressed with our options and hungry for an alternative. I joined and volunteered for the BC Liberals in my teens in the mid-1990s, when it was led by Gordon Wilson (before his nuttiness was evident) and was the third-party in BC. And when it was also still what you and I would call liberal.

Then when the Socreds imploded, they essentially launched take-over of sorts and Campbell took the leadership. They still seemed liberal enough in 1996, when they lost the seat-count to Clark’s NDP (but won the popular vote). I then headed East for university and, when I came back around 2002, they weren’t so liberal anymore. In government they’d taken a sharp shift to the right, leaving many centrist Liberals feeling homeless. Some stuck it out with the BC Liberals, others voted NDP. I cast my ballot based on the local candidates, supporting and voting for both parties over the years but with enthusiasm for neither.

It’s a situation many in BC find themselves in. The BC Liberals are too right; the BC NDP too left (and not particularly welcoming to federal Liberals either, which doesn’t help). It leaves many on the sidelines, and many holding their noses to vote for the lesser evil. And neither party seems particularly inclined to appeal to this disenchanted centre.

It leads to a teeter-totter of voter support in the province. The province, when it had enough of the Harcourt/Clark years, reduced the NDP to two seats in 2001, handing 77 seats to the Liberals. They gave Campbell two more majorities but with decreasing enthusiasm and now, with their handling of the HST feeding underlying fatigue and disenchantment with the governing party, the polls show the BC NDP is again poised to win a mandate (although the election won’t be until 2013).

The opposition New Democratic Party has harnessed public anger over the harmonized sales tax to open its biggest lead since Gordon Campbell's B.C. Liberals took power in 2001, a new Angus Reid poll has found.

Conducted this week, the poll found the NDP have 47 per cent support, a commanding 18 points ahead of the governing Liberals.

The Liberals have the support of just 29 per cent of people across the province, the poll found, 17 points below their total in the election last May. The Green Party has 15 per cent support, and the B.C. Conservative Party has five per cent.

Interestingly, though, it’s not as ifBritish Columbians are suddenly enamored with Carole James and the BC NDP. It’s just that they’re really pissed at Campbell’s Liberals, and there’s no other real option.

Forty per cent of people polled described the NDP as "inefficient," and 37 per cent called it "weak."

What if there was another option, though? That’s where it gets interesting:

The poll found that a newly created centre-left party could form the government if it ran in the May 2013 election.

When asked, 34 per cent of people said they would vote for the new party, ahead of 28 per cent who said they would vote NDP. A new centre-left party would relegate the B.C. Liberals to third, the poll found.

That may sound like a surprising number, but to seasoned observers of BC politics it really shouldn’t be. There is a strong hunger for a centre-left alternative in the province, for a real Liberal party founded on core Liberal values and policies, instead of a party of conservatives usurping the Liberal name.

Could the vaunted BC Liberal coalition of right and centre (if it ever really existed other than in name) be ready to fracture? Maybe. Could we see a third party in the province, a party of the centre-left? If things get dire enough for the Campbell Liberals, it’s certainly possible we could see an exodus.

The question though is who flees though, and who do they attract. The other possibility is a strengthening of a right-wing party. Might some of the right-wing BC Liberals flee to the BC Conservative Party, or form their own alternative? The same Angus Reid poll showed a new right-wing party would guarantee an NDP majority and reduce the BC Liberals to 15% in the polls.

Even if the right fled, allowing the centre-left to reclaim the BC Liberals, the brand may be pretty tainted, sadly, at this point. A new party would seem like the better choice, with the better chance of securing voter support. It may be a question of who flees the BC Liberals first. But a centre-left party would have the best chance to form a government, drawing support from both centrist BC Liberals and BC NDP supporters who voted for the party by default. A solidly right-wing party wouldn't challenge for government.

We seem to go through these upheavals every now and again in BC. The constant, though, has been a two-party system. The BC Liberals were largely a fringe party under Wilson until the Socred takeover. We essentially traded the Socreds for the new “Liberals.”

Now we may be due for another upheaval. Whatever happens though, I hope we don’t end up with another two-party province. The ideal situation would be parties of the left, right and centre. And wherever you’d put the Greens.

BCers deserve clear choices, and they’ve been lacking for far too long.

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Will B.C. have a referendum on the HST?

They will if Bill Vander Zalm (yes, that Vander Zalm) gets his way. From Elections BC:

British Columbia’s Chief Electoral Officer, Harry Neufeld, has granted approval in principle on an initiative petition application. The petition will be issued to proponent William Vander Zalm on Tuesday, April 6, 2010. The title of the initiative is: An initiative to end the harmonized sales tax (HST).

“This is the seventh initiative petition application to be approved since the legislation came into force in 1995″, notes Neufeld.

Any registered voter can apply to have a petition issued to gather support for a legislative proposal. After the petition is issued, the proponent will have 90 days to canvass and collect signatures of at least 10% of the registered voters in each of the 85 electoral districts.

Individuals or organizations who intend to oppose the initiative, conduct initiative advertising, or canvass for signatures must be registered with Elections BC. The deadline to apply for registration as an initiative opponent is March 8, 2010.

Registered voters as of April 6, 2010 may sign the petition for the electoral district in which they are registered. Voters may only sign the petition once.

The release notes this is the seventh petition application to be attempted under the legislation since 1995. I don’t recall any of the others, so I’d guess they didn’t take off. Certainly they didn’t succeed. I know the similarly structured MLA recall ability has also regularly failed to come close to success. And that only requires voters in one district.

An HST referendum requires 10 per cent of voters in every riding to sign on, and they have to do it in 90 days. That’s a tough hill to climb. For sure, there is anger in the province over the HST and particularly, I think, around the fact it came just after an election in which Gordon Campbell made no mention of it. But does the Vander Zalm camp have the organizational moxie to pull this off? Perhaps, but I’m skeptical. It has a chance, though. It will be interesting to see if Carole James and the BC NDP sign on.

Here are the specifics of the Vander Zalm initiative:

The purpose of the initiative draft Bill is to declare that the agreement between the federal government and the British Columbia government to establish a harmonized sales tax (HST) is not in effect. The draft Bill would reinstate the 7% provincial sales tax (PST) with the same exemptions as were in effect as of June 30, 2010 and establish the provincial sales tax as the only sales tax in British Columbia for the purposes of raising provincial revenue. The draft Bill proposes that it be effective retroactively to June 30, 2010. The Bill also proposes that the provincial share of HST revenues received between June 30, 2010 and the date of Royal Assent of the Bill that exceeds what would be collected under the PST rules as of June 30, 2010 would be reimbursed to British Columbians on a per capita basis.

What happens if they get the necessary signatures? A quick perusal of the Elections BC guidelines outlines the process:

The Select Standing Committee on Legislative Initiatives must meet within 30 days of receipt of the initiative petition and draft Bill. The Select Standing Committee has 90 days to consider the legislative proposal. The Committee must either table a report recommending introduction of the draft Bill or refer the initiative petition and draft Bill to the Chief Electoral Officer for an initiative vote.

If an initiative vote is required, a vote will be held on September 24, 2011, and on the last Saturday of September in every third year after that date. If more than 50% of the total number of registered voters in the province vote in favour of an initiative, and more than 50% of the total number of registered voters in each of at least 2/3 of the electoral districts in the province vote in favour of an initiative, the Chief Electoral Officer must declare the initiative vote to be successful and the government must introduce the Bill at the earliest practicable opportunity.

After a Bill is introduced into the legislature, the requirements of the Recall and Initiative Act have been satisfied, and any subsequent reading, amendment, or passage of the Bill will proceed as with any other Bill, with no guarantee of passage.

So, by my read, the committee (on which I’d imagine the governing Campbell Liberals would have a majority) could either decide to introduce (and presumably support) the bill, ending the process with its passage (unlikely they’d flip-flop on the HST) or let it go to a referendum in a year-and-a-half. If it did get that far, the latter scenario would seem more likely. Even if the referendum succeeds, in theory in seems the government could still use its majority to kill the legislation, but with a clear verdict in a referendum that scenario seems highly unlikely.

It would be an interesting campaign and, as much as the anti-HST folks would like to think they’re on the side of the angels as anti-tax crusaders, the reality is far different and a referendum could allow some of those nuances to be examined. Still, the pro-HST campaign would be a challenging one to wage.

My question for Vander Zalm though, and it’s not a small one: would he give all that harmonization money ($1.6 billion) the Harper Conservatives gave the province back to the feds? That would leave a huge hole in the province’s budget. What cuts would he make to compensate for it? The fact is, as much as some opponents may wish, I don’t think the HST genie can be stuffed back into the bottle. I suspect the smarter among the opponents know this – they’re just playing the politics.

And while such practical considerations will likely pale next to the populism of this thing, I really fail to see how the HST genie can be gotten back into the bottle. Despite the obvious difficulties in selling it, and the expected difficulties in implementation, not to mention the poor timing of doing this during a downturn, the fact remains that the idea of harmonizing federal and provincial sales taxes is good policy. Tough politics, yes, but good policy. We can take issue with the nuts and bolts, and demand tinkering to reduce negative effects, but the overarching policy is sound. It will save businesses money and create jobs for citizens. It did in Atlantic Canada, and it will in Ontario and B.C.

While I’ll take issue with Campbell conveniently finding religion on this mere days after an election, and with the Conservatives running away from it despite actively encouraging it and writing huge cheques to grease the wheels, it is still the right policy and I think more people should give credit to politicians like Campbell and Dalton McGuinty that pursue the right policy, even if the politics are horrible. Certainly it makes me think less of those that know the policy is right, but oppose it solely for partisan advantage.

I’m doubtful this will ever come to a referendum vote. But I hope this doesn’t mark a move towards the ballot initiative craziness we see in the U.S. political system, a trend that has led in large part to California’s fiscal crisis. It may be easy to rally populist anger against a government decision. But governing isn’t black and white. Governing is a series of interlocking decisions and tough choices. Every decision has rippling consequences. Pull one string and the whole tapestry unravels pretty quickly. Kill the HST, what happens then? What other taxes change to compensate? What does it mean for businesses? What about the federal compensation money? What budget cuts need to be made to give that back?

It’s not as easy as voting on one item in isolation. That’s why I’m not supportive of this sort of initiative campaign. We elect our political leaders to govern on our behalf, using their best judgment to consider all the factors and make the best decisions they can. We trust in their judgment.

And if they don’t live up to that trust, if we disagree with their calls on these tough choices, the place to make our displeasure known is by voting them out on election day.

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Beware where we place the ethical and moral bar

Following the publication of his "inappropriate" Facebook photos, I can see how the BC NDP and its former Vancouver-False Creek candidate, Ryan Lam, thought it was best to part ways and find a new candidate. Nip the story in the bud and don't let it distract from bigger issues.

It really is unfortunate, though that it has come to this. He shouldn't have had to step aside. And we're all going to be the poorer because he did.

I think both the public, and political partisans, need to do some thinking here, because with the coming generation of young politicians having embraced the digital era, the world of Facebook and blogging and Twitter, stories such as Lam's are going to become all the more common.

So he consensually groped a woman. Anyone who has spend any time on Parliament Hill knows such behavior is hardly foreign to our politicians, going back to Sir John A MacDonald's era. I'd have loved to have seen Pierre Trudeau's Facebook photos. Or read Sir John's tweets:

BigJohn: Getting on boat to PEI to talk Canadian union. Picking up Cartier in Montreal we're gonna get soo drunk y'all.

This isn't new behavior by our politicians. Technology is just exposing us to visual evidence we didn't have before. And while sharing such information online is perfectly acceptable for their generation, for the older generation it's decidedly not.

We need to think though about where we're going to draw the line. For the public, we need to ask ourselves, what kind of political representatives we want. Politicians are people like you and I. Set the bar of ethical behavior so high and the only people willing to put their names on a ballot will be closeted loners. Not a positive advancement.

And for partisans, sure, it's easy to jump on any potentially embarrassing misdeed and demand resignation. But we need to remember, when we encourage the bar to be set that high it's going to be a level we have to reach as well. Be ridulous and it'll bite your own team in the ass too.

Maybe the BC NDP has an itchy trigger-finger after its federal cousins lost three candidates in BC last election. Frankly, I thought only two of them really needed to go: Dana Larsen (only because he was driving while high) and Julian West (exposing yourself to underage girls and asking them to paint your genitalia is incredibly wrong to all generations). But I'd have fought for Kirk Tousaw were I the NDP, who cares if he smoked pot on TV?

But with the Lam case, both the NDP and the Liberals set an unfortunate precedent that future candidates will have to be held to. And we should all be asking ourselves: is this a good thing?

Hell, if we held everyone to Dana Larsen's standard, Gordon Campbell wouldn't be the Liberal candidate in Vancouver-Point Grey, now would he?

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The politics of green

And by green I don’t mean money, although dolla bills are certainly part of the equation. No, by green I mean environmental policy, and specifically carbon shifts, carbon taxes, green shifts, NAMBLA, whatever you want to call it.

With two green policy motions (dating back how many years, I don’t know) set to be debated at the upcoming Liberal convention that mention a carbon tax (in passing, it should be noted, as one possible component of a wider environmental policy) the issue is back somewhat on the federal scene. The Conservatives are/will also try to make something of Ignatieff’s original support for a carbon tax.

I’m fairly confident that a carbon tax won’t be part of our election platform. Even though every expert agrees it’s the superior solution. We took it to the people last time, and they said no. They didn’t like the tradeoffs. That’s democracy. We’ll try other approaches. C’est la vie. If public opinion comes around in the future, we can revisit it.

What’s more interesting though is what’s happening on the carbon tax front in British Columbia, where the provincial election is underway. There, the carbon tax is already implemented by the BC Liberals (no relation). And it caused us federal folks no end of frustration during the last election, with both the NDP and the Conservatives teaming-up to spread lies and misinformation, scare-mongering about double taxation and promoting other myths.

But federal headaches aside, it has been fascinating to watch the carbon tax drama unfold in BC.

There was a time I might have looked at a carbon tax as an ‘Only Nixon could go to China’ kind of thing. It’s good policy, but the fed Libs would (and did) get slammed on the right for trying it (my idealistic hopes we could pull it off to the contrary). But if you sold a conservative government (like the BC Libs) on a carbon shift, which every environmental expert will tell you is the right policy, and had that conservative government put it forward, then surely the more progressive parties would be on board, and Bob’s your uncle.

Well, the first half worked. Gordon Campbell went to China. And then the BC NDP went all Joe McCarthy on his ass.

It’s hard to see the NDP’s decision to oppose the carbon tax as anything but political opportunism, designed to win rural votes in Northern British Columbia, where the carbon tax is deeply unpopular. Any support their stance wins them though may cost them support with their traditional base, however:

"A step backwards for climate action." That's how three environmental organizations described the provincial New Democrat's campaign platform during a media briefing today, stating the "positive ideas" included in that document are "insufficient to compensate" for the party's promise to cancel the carbon tax. At the same time, they applauded the Liberals for taking British Columbia from being a climate change "laggard to leader in four years" by introducing that tax, among other measures.

Or maybe not. Because while three groups were present for yesterday’s presser attacking the BC NDP’s climate change platform (the David Suzuki Foundation, ForestEthics and The Pembina Institute), a year ago 16 environmental groups came together to support the carbon tax. Because I guess, for some environmental groups, while criticizing NDP opposition to a carbon tax is one thing, doing so on the eve of an election is quite another.

From the Western Canada Wilderness Committee:

"Yes, the wilderness committee is disappointed that the NDP do not support the carbon tax. But, in a broader environmental sense, we are very pleased with many parts of the NDP platform - including their protection of BC Hydro and keeping it public and protected, our best tool for fighting climate change."

(snip)

"Well, I understand their disappointed over the NDP not following the carbon tax, but for God sake! The sucking up to large industrial polluters, the gutting of everything from the Forest Practices Code to the very right for citizens to know whose polluting in their neighborhoods, the catering to the carbon spewing industries - including those industries that profit from sprawl development - why in the Hell would you support that or pander to it in this way?"

Fair enough. A carbon tax is just one element of environmental policy. It’s one that the BC Liberals have gotten right, and it’s a significant step, but it’s perfectly legitimate to argue they’ve dropped the ball in other areas, and that the NDP platform is superior in other areas.

And one wonders, even if the NDP does piss off some of their green base, where is it going to go? It’s like the federal Conservatives pissing off the so-cons: where are they going to go?

Some may go BC Liberal, but probably not in large numbers. They fundamentally disagree with Gordo on too many other issues to hold their noses. What would be interesting is if we see NDP supporters going to the Green Party, particularly in urban seats. It could be enough of a margin to swing a few seats. Most though will probably take the pragmatic view and hold their noses, remembering Kang and Kodos’ advice about voting for third-party candidates.

So, it will be fascinating to see how the carbon tax issue plays-out in the BC election campaign. As an interesting sidenote though, consider how this could play out if we’d passed STV in 2005 (hopefully we’ll pass it this time). Rather than feeling they need to vote NDP to stop Campbell and with the impact of those that do go Green being muted by FPTP, under STV green NDP supporters would feel freer to vote Green to express their carbon tax displeasure. And it wouldn’t take much of a percentage shift to see a number of seats go from NDP to Green. You’d also likely see the BC Liberals bleed seats to the Reform/Conservatives/ whatever they’re calling themselves these days.

It would be a very different legislature, with very different dynamics, to be sure. This could be the last election where the NDP could get away with a strategic calculation like this. Time will tell.

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Third-party mud starts to fly in BC election

BC politics has always been a little out there. From the Bennetts to Vanderzalm, from bingogate to hydrogate to Taxman Glen, politics in Lotusland have always been a little wacky. There will be an election May 12 and things are starting to heat-up again.

Rather that fling mud themselves though, right now it looks like its third-party proxy groups that are getting their hands dirty. Possibly the most outrageous example is an advertisement called "Gordon Campbell Hates You" from MoveForwardBC.ca, a group launched by the Canadian Office and Professional Employees Union, Local 378 (COPE 378) to attack the BC Liberals.



This moves beyond negative to downright insulting and disgusting, with a big dash of stupid thrown in. Far from being effective, I think it just undermines the credibility of the organization promoting it.

On the other side of the spectrum is Vote Smart BC, set-up by the Independent Contractors and Builders Association of BC (ICBA), to take on the BC NDP. They oppose unionization in the industry. They don't have the option of embedding their videos (bad social media strategy, ICBA!) but they have a number of ads on their site. They go after the BC NDP in a much tamer although still negative way, using two animated yard signs to slam the NDP's record in government in the 1990s. There's also a game where you can race a fast ferry using a rowboat. You always seem to either get swamped in the wake, get pushed to victory by a rip tide, or win when the ferry gets hauled off to auction.

Just a taste of politics, BC style. And the increasing influence of third-party money and advertising, particularly when fixed election dates gives everyone time to get the mud ready to fly well in advance.
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The next MLA for Comox Valley, Don McRae

Congratulations to Courtenay city councilor Don McRae, who last night won the BC Liberal nomination for my home riding back in BC, Comox Valley.

Don has been an effective city councilor and will be going up against the NDP’s Leslie McNabb in the May 12 provincial election to fill the seat that was held by the late Stan Hagen, who held a number of senior cabinet posts under Gordon Campbell and sadly succumbed suddenly to cancer earlier this year.

Courtenay Coun. Don McRae will be looking for a new hat in the coming months, with his win last night of the BC LIberal nomination for May's provincial election.

"Obviously, very happy about the outcome, and about the months to come," said McRae, talking about his third-ballot win Thursday night.

With the sudden passing of long-time MLA Stan Hagen in January, the candidacy in the local riding was left wide open. Along with McRae, B.C. Shellfish Growers' Association executive director Roberta Stevenson, Salvation Army Community Services Director Shawn Wilson and local Habitat for Humanity founder Jon Toogood put their names forward.

I was a high school student at GP Vanier Secondary School in Courtenay when Don began his career there as a social studies teacher. I was never in one of his classes but he’s a good guy that was popular with the students, and I like the idea of potentially having someone in the legislature with a little social studies knowledge. (Even though we really need good social studies teachers in the classroom now more than ever.)

So, good luck to Don in the upcoming election. It should be a very interesting race. There is recent NDP history in the riding under Margaret Lord and Evelyn Gillespie. Hagen, who had the keys to a powerful Socred electoral machine (lent to John Duncan over the years), was pretty popular in the community, and barely held the riding in 2005 over the NDP’s Andrew Black.

Don brings obviously some profile as a multi-term city councilor, and hopefully will inherit the keys to Hagen’s election machine. I really don’t know anything about the NDP candidate, except she worked in the forestry industry. I do know that 585 people voted in the Liberal nomination vs. 128 in the NDP nomination, for whatever that’s indicative of. Maybe grassroots energy, maybe nothing much. The NDP had a strong union machine in the Comox Valley, but I'm not sure what shape it's in these days.

I think it’s anybody’s election at this point. The economy and jobs are obviously going to be the key issues. The Comox Valley is going through tough times. We still have CFB Comox as a major employer, but we were forestry and resource-dependent for years and that’s obviously drying-up. That leaves us with tourism and little else, and tourism is hard to rely on. Homelessness and crime are increasing problems, and symptomatic of the larger jobs issues.

I’ll try to keep an eye on the race from afar.

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