B.C. election: How a little-known interim Conservative leader could become premier today

British Columbia voters headed to the polls on Saturday, closing out an unusually turbulent election period that could see the Conservative party take power in a surprising upset, potentially unseating the province’s NDP premier following his highly unpopular snap election call.

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Polling just before election day showed Eby’s NDP trailing the British Columbia Conservative Party and its interim leader, Lorne Doerkson, by a narrow margin, with the final result too close to call.

Saturday’s result could see the largely unknown Doerkson, a former rodeo announcer and newspaper publisher, take over the role of premier at a critical juncture in Western Canadian politics. He would take over the position from Eby, who called an election two years early in a move widely viewed as a cynical political manoeuvre, and whose campaign has stumbled over repeated gaffes.

The election comes at a time when B.C. is struggling under the strain of increasing fiscal deficits, high taxes, weak private sector investment and rising unaffordability. Last year, a record high 70,000 young people left the province, driven out by high housing costs and onerous taxes. Voters also go the ballot box at a time when the province is targeting massive infrastructure investments alongside Prime Minister Mark Carney, with plans to plow billions into critical infrastructure like new transmission lines, liquefied natural gas export terminals and proposed new mines.

In a campaign video posted in September, Doerkson lamented the province’s ballooning deficits and a debt-to-GDP ratio that has doubled to 30 per cent, suggesting the B.C. government would need to intervene to reverse the province’s fiscal problems.

“We’ve seen what a decade of mismanagement in this province looks like,” he said.

“The NDP have driven our economy off the cliff, while unaffordability has gone higher and higher.”

The Conservative party is the latest name for what used to be the BC Liberal party, made up of a collection of centrist and centre-right members. The party technically last held the premier’s office under former premier Christy Clark, who was ousted by NDP leader John Horgan in 2017, ending the party’s 16-year run in power. The NDP, under Horgan and then under Eby, have held the office since then.

Meanwhile, Eby’s election campaign has been riddled with political gaffes, which began immediately after the election call itself. Eby’s NDP called the snap election less than 48 hours after the Conservative party had ousted its controversial leader, Kerry-Lynne Findlay, which commentators widely viewed as politically motivated.

The premier has also scored a number of own-goals during the campaign, including when he was forced to admit that his children were enrolled in the province’s $10-per-day daycare program — spots that are highly coveted, and meant to be filled by the province’s most needy families. He would later use a wildfire analogy in an attack against Doerkson that backfired badly, while the NDP would use the province’s electoral agency to push voters to back them in a move that critics say didn’t properly attribute the NDP to the effort.

Eby has himself acknowledged that the timing of the election call is a major concern among voters.

Summarizing what he’s heard from voters in recent public remarks, Eby said: “‘Why are we having an election? I’ve got other things going on. Just go and do the government stuff, don’t bother me with an election,'” Eby said. “And look, I get it, I know that people have a lot going on, I know they didn’t want an election right now. I hear the frustration and I understand it.”

In an interview with CBC on Friday, Eby appeared to express regret over the timing, but said that his main misstep was failing to properly notify voters of his intentions.

“There’s no question that I got ahead of British Columbians in terms of my understanding of what was happening in the legislature,” he said, adding that he had “regret about not bringing British Columbians along on that issue.”

In recent weeks, Eby has pivoted his focus toward addressing Green voters and urging them to support the NDP in order to avoid splitting the progressive vote and giving power to the Conservatives. Last election, there were 11 ridings in which the NDP lost to the Conservatives, but would have won if all the support for the Greens had gone to the NDP. In recent remarks earlier this month, he directly appealed to Green supporters to “think very carefully” about what a Conservative government would mean for B.C.

“The Green vote wasn’t enough to elect a Green candidate, but it was the difference between a Conservative being elected and the NDP being elected,” Eby said, referring to the 11 ridings. “This election is about the future, the direction of our province, and not with some of the small differences that we may have with people who are thinking about voting Green.”

The BC Green party is led by Emily Lowan, and some polls have forecast the party to potentially win a few seats in the election as progressive voters turn away from the NDP.

In a recent Leger poll, 44 per cent of decided voters said they would support the Conservatives, while 39 per cent said they would support the NDP. Polling outfit The Writ projected the Conservatives to take 45.7 per cent of the vote, compared with 41.2 per cent for the NDP and 10.8 per cent for the Greens.

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