Good morning.
Less than a week to go before the votes are tabulated in the B.C. election, and as I write this, the polling aggregator 338Canada shows an impossibly tight race, with the Conservatives and the NDP sharing an equal percentage of support among those who have responded to various polls.
British Columbians have been here before. In 2017, the BC Liberals (rebranded last year as BC United) captured 40.37 per cent of the popular vote, while the NDP achieved 40.29 per cent. But after weeks of turmoil and backroom dealing, the NDP managed to form a minority government with the help of three elected Green MLAs. (It’s worth that noting back then that the Conservatives received 0.53 per cent of the popular vote.)
As a result, Surrey and its 10 ridings are crucially important. The city is the second-largest in the province, but it is the fastest-growing. Surrey’s demographics change with its growth and its electorate is pragmatic, rather than partisan.
Reporter Frances Bula stopped by a No Frills there recently to get a notion of what people are thinking. She found people worried about exploding density, a response to the housing crisis. But she also found people worried about the cost of homes.
One person worried about too many people coming into the city; another worried that the Conservatives’ policies on harm reduction were shortsighted, though appreciated the party’s pledge for more treatment. Yet another person didn’t like anyone running.
The views aren’t terribly different from the wider electorate. But candidates for both the NDP and Conservatives in Surrey were working hard to localize their policies.
As Frances writes, the Conservatives have promised a SkyTrain extension to Newton and better bus service throughout south-of-Fraser cities, where bus use has boomed more than anywhere else in the region after the early pandemic drop. They have also promised to expand the Patullo Bridge to six lanes, though an expansion of the bridge is already under way.
The NDP is trying to remind voters of what the government has started or completed: building a new hospital and cancer centre in Cloverdale; six new schools with more than 8,000 seats since 2017 and 6,500 more already committed; a promise to build rental housing for hospital workers; a reiteration of the 2020 promise to build a medical school attached to Surrey’s Simon Fraser University campus.
Neither party would dream of talking about bringing back tolls. Former NDP premier John Horgan eked out his minority in 2017 in part because of his promise to cancel the bridge tolls brought in by the BC Liberals.
Prominent Surrey NDP MLAs Bruce Ralston and Harry Bains aren’t running again, so some voters are set to choose among a raft of little-known newcomers in their former ridings. And while the NDP still has incumbents running, the Conservatives have two strong candidates, current MLA Elenore Sturko in Surrey-Cloverdale and former Surrey mayor Linda Hepner in Surrey-Serpentine.
(Ten-year-old comments surfaced last week by Conservative candidate Brent Chapman in Surrey-South didn’t go over well. He earned a rare rebuke from Conservative Leader John Rustad and had to apologize for writing on Facebook that Palestinians are “little inbred walking, talking, breathing time bombs.”)
Hamish Telford, a political science professor at the University of the Fraser Valley, said the Surrey ridings are key to the NDP’s chances. He said the dominance of people in the trucking, taxi and building industry may also have an impact. Those voters may be swayed with party promises of more construction, a future that promises the need for more supplies (delivered by truck), more houses to build and more solutions for traffic congestion.
Surrey also has huge numbers of residents working in various levels of health care, especially the home-care sector. And the city is a place where crime is a big concern because of years-long gang activity, something that affects many young people and their families.
Kelly Sather is the campaign manager for incumbent NDP MLA Mike Starchuk in Surrey-Cloverdale. Overseeing a roomful of volunteers on laptops, many of them Mr. Starchuk’s former firefighter colleagues, she acknowledged it’s going to be a tough fight.
“This is more similar to 2017 than 2020. I would say this is an election where every vote in Surrey counts,” Ms. Sather said.
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.