The NDP's failure in B.C.

It has definitely been a while since I posted anything here, and it has taken a surprising and disappointing election result for me to come out of my hibernation.  What I wanted to write about, of course, is the result of the British Columbia provincial election last week.  What happened was not only a spectacular failure in polling, but an equally spectacular failed campaign by the supposed frontrunner NDP.

So how did Christy Clark's Liberals defeat Adrian Dix's NDP so convincingly when every opinion poll right up to the election date showed them behind?  First of all, there was obviously a huge failure in  polling.  A similar failure in the recent election in Alberta could be explained away as an unusual series of events, but there can be no such excuses made for the failure in BC.  The polls were simply dead wrong, and until polling companies figure out what went wrong and are able to demonstrate that they have made the necessary corrections, political polls simply cannot be trusted - in Canada at least.

However, while the polls lead almost everyone to believe it would be an easy NDP win, the results were actually in line with what the norm has been in BC politics for decades now.  For nearly 60 years, with only a  few exceptions, a right wing, or centre-right coalition, have been elected over an NDP opposition with a decisive, but non-overwhelming, majority.  The split has typically been around 60-70% of the seats for the winners as compared to around 30-40% for the NDP.  Exceptions have been NDP wins in 1972, 1991 and 1996, as well as a crushing 77 to 2 seat win for the Liberals in 2001.  From that perspective, this election has been a part of a very stable, long term, trend.

All of this offers little consolation, however, for those of us who had been hoping for an NDP win.  In an environment where NDP governments as not the norm (which would include just about everywhere federally or provincially with the exception, perhaps, of Manitoba and Saskatchewan), many things have to go right for the party to win.  The elements need to include a very good strategy, a popular or respected leader, and dissatisfaction with the current government.  In B.C. there was dissatisfaction with the current government, although a good economy probably muted that somewhat, and Dix was fairly well respected, although the Liberals were able cause some people to doubt his ethics.  What the NDP lacked was a strategy that worked.  I won't get into this in much detail, as many others have done so (see Climenhaga, Harper and Ramsey), but by refusing to attack the Liberal government, when doing so would have reminded people just why they had grown to dislike them, by refusing to refute accusations levelled against them, and by not making it clear to the public what they stood for, the NDP doomed themselves.

A naturally governing party could, perhaps get away with such strategic failures.  However, as much as I hate to admit it, people in most provinces have a mistrust for NDP governments stemming from many decades of being told by other parties and much of the media that they are too radical and that they are incompetent in managing the economy or government finances.  It takes some extra effort for the NDP to gain the electorate's confidence, and a weak campaign just isn't good enough to prevail over an unpopular government.  For the NDP to win almost anywhere, it will require a convergence of factors, none more important than a plan that works.  This is the electorate the NDP faced in B.C.  The majority of the population was not used to voting for the party, and when not given a convincing reason to change their default choice, they returned to what was familiar.

Gateway pipeline looks unlikely; and the popular Quebec election debates

There was an interesting article in today's Globe and Mail on the difference of opinion between Alberta and British Columbia on the proposed Northern Gateway pipeline.  While 63 percent of Albertans support the project, 56 percent of British Columbians oppose it.  It is becoming increasingly unlikely that the project will go ahead, especially given that Adrian Dix is almost sure to become premier of BC after the election next spring and is dead set against it.  Even if Christy Clark's Liberals somehow pulls off a miracle win, they will be under a lot of pressure to stop the deal.  The federal government does have jurisdiction over the project, but as the article says, winning seats in British Columbia is key to the Conservatives winning their next election.  So in the end the pipeline will probably not get built, at least not anytime soon, and rightly so.

On to the Quebec election, in her column today Chantal Hebert writes about the surprising number of people who tuned into the provincial election debates.  It was an unusual format this year with four debates, the first with the leaders of all four of the main parties, and then three nights of debates featuring head-to-head duels between the leaders of the three parties with the potential to win.  As she suggests, the debates were useful in that by changing between formats, viewers were able to get a more complete view of the leaders and their ideas.  Debates are often the only opportunity the voters have during an election campaign to see the leaders speak unscripted.  They also give viewers a chance to see the leaders answer questions they would usually avoid.  So it would be great to see more debates become common practice across Canada.