Good morning.
By last week, BC United Leader Kevin Falcon was feeling alone in his big tent.
Falcon was the inheritor of a political party that surged to government in 2001 by winning 77 of 79 seats after two terms of NDP government that ended in scandal and voter disgust. Falcon was elected then with the BC Liberals, a party that despite the name, had meticulously crafted a centre-right coalition of voters whose leanings federally were both Liberal and Conservative – the proverbial big tent.
That coalition held, despite losing government in 2017, until two years ago when Falcon kicked five-term MLA John Rustad from caucus over his musings on social media, questioning climate change.
But the last year has seen a convergence of ruinous circumstances for Falcon. The party elected to change its name, an effort to divorce itself from a brand associated with an increasingly unpopular federal party, but a move that also disconnected the party from its own brand of progressive and fiscally responsible, government. And the name change came at the same time as Rustad took on the moribund BC Conservative brand and hitched it to the soaring coattails of federal Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre.
By the time the legislature rose for this summer, the BC United caucus had shrunk from 28 MLAs to 25. Other MLAs had been approached to switch parties for the coming October election. Still more had chosen not to run at all. Recent polls were putting BC United on par with the Greens, light-years away from the party’s hopes at beating the NDP and forming government once more.
And then the business community – the group that had long formed the backbone of support for the right-of-centre that opposed the NDP – made their choice bluntly plain. Political donations dried up and some of Falcon’s closest confidants were prepared to publicly support the BC Conservatives, a further professional and personal humiliation.
As Justine Hunter and Mike Hager reported, Chris Gardner, president of the Independent Contractors and Businesses Association, a lobby group for the province’s real estate development and construction industry, said many of the owners of the 4,000-odd businesses were alarmed at the splitting of the right-of-centre vote and concerned about an NDP return to government.
Falcon decided, without consulting his caucus or his membership, to suspend the BC United campaign. The bombshell announcement last week meant the 50 BCUP candidates – including sitting MLAs – that had already undergone rigorous vetting and nomination battles had their campaigns suspended. They were given only notice minutes before the official news conference. The Conservatives may decide to name them as candidates, but there are no guarantees.
“I know that the best thing for the future of our province is to defeat the NDP, but we cannot do that when the centre-right vote is split,” Falcon said, adding that he would not run in the next election.
Caucus members, who were getting wind of the decision because reporters were calling to verify tips, called an emergency meeting. One of them demanded Falcon resign, which Falcon had already decided to do.
The rationale for uniting the centre-right vote was hinged on one goal: getting rid of the NDP government.
The move means voters in October will have a choice between the NDP and, erm, not the NDP.
The business community in B.C. has been increasingly alarmed at the party’s fiscal policies, though in news releases, the BC Business Council’s criticism has been muted. When the NDP released its election-year budget in February with a massive $8-billion deficit, the business council said it “lacks sufficient focus on fiscal discipline.” Bond rating agency S&P Global Ratings downgraded the province for the third time in three years.
So voters concerned about the province’s finances have a clear choice with the Conservatives.
But Falcon’s move has obliterated options for those BC Liberal supporters who want fiscally responsible government but that also doesn’t cater to some of the same ideologies and rhetoric as the federal Conservatives.
The BC Liberals, under former premier Gordon Campbell, introduced North America’s first carbon tax, supported a dramatic expansion of supervised drug-consumption sites, and brought in sexual orientation and gender identity (SOGI) education in schools. The BC Conservatives have proposed to dismantle all of these policies.
In an editorial board meeting with the Globe last May, Rustad said it was “false” that humans burning fossil fuels are the cause of climate change and he denied climate change is a crisis. Rustad did not answer last week when asked if the new agreement with BC United meant his views on climate change had changed.
“I have said all along, ‘We’re not changing our principles and the values that we stand for,’” he said. A spokesman for Rustad said later that the party will unveil its policies on climate change as part of its forthcoming campaign platform.
Also in May, Rustad said he supported government committees to vet all books in school libraries and said he would tear up NDP housing policies aimed at alleviating a housing crisis, saying they were too coercive to municipalities.
No doubt, the Conservatives’ platform will evolve and there’s lots of time for them to introduce themselves.
But in the meantime, anyone thinking that the collapse of BC United would mean their supporters would naturally join the Conservatives may want to pay attention.
Shortly after Falcon’s deal was announced, Premier David Eby and the NDP were quick to issue a video welcoming those voters who may be thinking about issues beyond the balance sheet. Respected former BC Liberal health minister Terry Lake and former BC Liberal operative Mark Marissen said they’d vote for the NDP.
“There’s no Liberal element to this coalition, so it’s not really a coalition,” said Marissen.
”It’s the Conservative party.”
This is the weekly British Columbia newsletter written by B.C. Editor Wendy Cox. If you’re reading this on the web, or it was forwarded to you from someone else, you can sign up for it and all Globe newsletters here.