The 2024 British Columbia election will be the first of three Canadian provincial elections in October. It is also one of the most intriguing we have seen out of Canada in years.
Imagine you are talking to a Canadian political follower from, say, five years ago about British Columbia politics. The NDP is in power, but have a minority government, holding fewer seats than the BC Liberals but ruling with the help of the Greens. Whereas the NDP is the province’s centre-left party, the BC Liberals, despite the name, were the lead party on the centre-right. It had been this way for decades since the Social Credit Party collapsed.
Now tell them that in five years, the BC Liberals will essentially cease to exist and that the zero-seat Conservative Party could win a provincial election in 2024. The party that ran only a handful of candidates and managed less than one percent of the vote in 2017: those BC Conservatives. They would either say you’re nuts or claim that they saw it coming. The latter might be lying, as the BC Liberals had been in power for 16 years from 2001 to 2017. However, it’s not the first time in Canadian politics that a party has gone from the most seats to collapse in a short period. It’s not even the first time in British Columbia provincial politics.
Nevertheless, here we are. The BC Liberals lost the 2020 election to the NDP in a landslide, had a disastrous rebrand to BC United, and gave up on the 2024 campaign. Now, it is the Conservative Party challenging the NDP for power.
Previous BC Election: 2020
In 2020, the NDP won British Columbia’s 2020 “Covid election” in a landslide. The premier at the time, John Horgan, took some criticism for calling a snap election during the pandemic, but it worked out for him and his party in the short term. Horgan and the BC NDP won their biggest mandate to this point, claiming 57 seats. (Source: Elections BC – PDF)
The BC Liberals struggled to connect with voters and failed to make the case to return to power after a brief stay in opposition. Their last election was a thorough defeat.
What’s Happening in the 2024 British Columbia Election
John Horgan is gone as BC NDP leader, and the incumbent premier, David Eby, will try to make it three in a row for his party. In fact, the only of the three major party leaders who was in place in 2020 was Sonia Furstenau, the BC Green leader.
A televised debate on CBC in early October highlighted some key differences between the parties. Eby pledged to keep spending levels where they are and promised help with affordability issues. John Rustad, leader of the BC Conservatives, focused some of his answers on so-called “culture war” issues like gender identity in schools and stating regret for taking the Covid-19 vaccine, but he also pledged to cut the carbon tax. (Source: CBC News) Finally, the BC Greens have called for tax increases on wealthier citizens and for the most profitable corporations. (Source: BC Greens)
2024 British Columbia Election Prediction
Opinion polls have been close, and depending on the day, you might see the BC NDP or BC Conservatives ahead. The Greens have generally lagged behind in the low teens, which might represent a drop-off from the 2020 election. One thing to keep in mind is that in 2017, the BC Liberals won the most seats and votes, barely, and still did not form government (Source: Wikipedia) Like the BC Liberals did in those elections, the BC Conservatives will run up the score in the interior. It all comes down to Metro Vancouver.
According to a recent Leger poll, the NDP has a slim lead in Metro Vancouver, and as expected on Vancouver Island. (Source: Leger – PDF)
Our best guess is that the NDP will win around 47 seats while the Conservatives win 44. The Greens will take the remaining two, giving the NDP a majority of a whopping one seat. Exact totals aside, our prediction is a narrow BC NDP majority government.
Based on how the campaign has gone, our concern for the BC Conservatives is how they will play in Vancouver with the social issues which have arisen. It will work in the interior, where they may gain some seats, but where else? As mentioned, the BC Conservatives will have a number of ridings where they run up the score, maybe more than the BC NDP will, so if the popular vote is tied or they’re losing by a little, they might be losing the whole thing.
