Geoff Russ: B.C. is a right wing province. The NDP was merely a chaotic interlude

Can people stop using “Left Coast” as a synonym for British Columbia?

Sign In or Create an Account

The politics of Canada’s Pacific province are far better than NDP propagandists and eastern critics make them out to be.

If B.C. is supposed to be the “Left Coast,” it has hardly earned that label. In fact, British Columbians refute it at the ballot box time and again.

B.C. Conservative leader Lorne Doerkson will become the 38th premier after leading the party to a triumph in the provincial election. Far from the close contest so many critics had hoped for, the election became a rout, with the B.C. Conservatives landing body blows before delivering the knockout punch to the NDP government.

Cabinet ministers and hopeful young MLAs went down in defeat. The smarter ones did not run for re-election at all. Perhaps they foresaw the disaster that would follow David Eby’s decision to call an early election to extend his political career. By the time the votes were counted, the B.C. Conservatives were nearly 11 points ahead of the shattered NDP in the popular vote, having won support from almost half of voters.

Columnist Jesse Kline keeps you up to date with what’s happening in Israel and the effects of antisemitism on life here in Canada. Friday mornings.

By signing up you consent to receive the above newsletter from Postmedia Network Inc.

A welcome email is on its way. If you don't see it, please check your junk folder.

The next issue of Channel Israel will soon be in your inbox.

We encountered an issue signing you up. Please try again

Even downtown Vancouver, the supposed citadel of socialism and slums, elected Conservative Margareta Dovgal to represent half of the city centre. B.C. needs a better publicity department.

Since 1952, the right has governed B.C. for 52 of 74 years. Before the NDP’s narrow victory in 2017, that share was about four-fifths. Whether under the banner of the Social Credit Party or the B.C. Liberals, the anti-left coalition has been the natural governing force.

Out here, the NDP’s spells in office are chaotic, controversial interludes that end in electoral disaster every time. Never has the NDP been cast out of the premier’s office without being devastated at the ballot box. Say what you will about the B.C. Liberals, they came within a hair’s breadth of retaining power in 2017. That began a long nine years in which the right and other anti-NDP factions regrouped around the resurgent B.C. Conservatives.

What are those factions? They are ordinary people in the suburbs, rank-and-file political conservatives, crunchy cons on Vancouver Island, moderates on Vancouver’s West Side, and the downtown business community. One faction may dominate at any given time, but together they are nearly invincible.

Yet the B.C. left’s greatest strength is its persistence. Although defeat has often been its default, it has excelled at mythmaking.

The NDP’s predecessor, the Co-operative Commonwealth Federation, never governed British Columbia. Nearly four decades separated its first provincial election in 1933 from the first NDP government in 1972. The New Democrats have proved far better at agitation and mobilization than at assembling a governing coalition.

When the NDP does break through, it is generally because of a divided anti-NDP vote rather than its own electoral appeal.

In 1972, the NDP won a majority with less than 40 per cent of the vote as the Social Credit Party fell victim to a vote split after 20 years in power. That NDP government lasted just three years before Social Credit regrouped and crushed it, launching another 16-year run of dominance that ended with a split in 1991. Another fracture in 1996 ensured the NDP won another majority while losing the popular vote.

The New Democrats were very good at exploiting the weaknesses of others, but their unlikely victories did not prove any great public enthusiasm for their policies.

There were exceptions, such as John Horgan’s historic majority victory in 2020, when he called an early election and capitalized on his government’s popularity during the pandemic, as didother premiers.

Even so, it was not a permanent realignment, as the 2026 election has just proven.

The long history of progressive activism in Vancouver has given rise to the conceit that this beautiful province is the “Left Coast.” Rather, the protest movements and labour unrest are part of B.C.’s real political centre of gravity: populism, which decidedly leans or lurches to the right.

Suspicion of Ottawa is very real here, as is a latent frontier spirit that is not yet extinguished. People still want to come here, whether to share in this ethos or to try to control it. Those in the latter camp usually fail.

Our economy’s backbone is still the natural resource sector, not green technology. Vancouverites themselves are subjected to policies that tolerate open-air drug dens, imposed by ideological leftists against their wishes. Indeed, city governments that try to normalize huffing fentanyl on a playground get turfed out after a term in office, a warning to the newly elected left-wing mayor and council.

That does not make B.C. a rock-ribbed, hard-right province, either. British Columbians like fair taxes, good public services and publicly funded health care, and will not stand for threats to any of them. This is hardly an unusual combination of priorities.

The B.C. Conservatives, contrary to fearmongering from a desperate Eby, promised all of these and won a broad coalition that spans all parts of the province. It says a great deal about the appeal of the anti-NDP brand that the Conservatives now hold seats on Vancouver Island, throughout the North and Interior, in inner and suburban Vancouver, and in the Kootenays.

You cannot drive along the highway for more than an hour before passing through an area represented by one of Lorne Doerkson’s Conservatives. The same cannot be said for the NDP, and this is normal here.

After nine years of NDP rule, the party has been reminded that it is not the West Coast’s natural governing party. They can invoke the “Left Coast” myth as much as they like, but they may as well recite lines from Star Wars, Narnia or any other fantasy that gives them comfort after last weekend.

Geoff Russ founded the political opinion site Without Diminishment with newly-elected B.C. Conservative Caroline Elliott.

This website uses cookies to personalize your content (including ads), and allows us to analyze our traffic. Read more about cookies here. By continuing to use our site, you agree to our Terms of Use and Privacy Policy.