The worst possible deal for B.C. Greens

Alot still needs to happen for British Columbia’s New Democrats and Greens to form a viable governing alliance in the province. For starters, Premier Christy Clark — as the leader who won the plurality of votes and seats in the recent election — has every right to face the legislature and present her vision for B.C., as she’s made clear she plans to do. But assuming the NDP and Greens are eventually given a chance to govern, their arrangement is likely to raise a lot of questions for voters, and is almost certain to end up being a bad deal for the Greens.

During the campaign, NDP leader John Horgan was harshly criticized for dodging important questions about his platform, including where he stands on the Site C dam construction project, and how he would pay for promises like removing Port Mann bridge tolls and eliminating Medical Service Plan premiums. Now, his policy positions are bound to get even murkier with the concessions he’s made to win Weaver’s support.

While the four-year agreement released by the NDP and Greens on Tuesday includes explicit commitments to “employ every tool available... to stop the expansion of the Kinder Morgan pipeline,” to increase the carbon tax by $5 per tonne per year starting in April 2018, and to work to implement a $ 15 minimum wage, it leaves many other important questions unanswered. The agreement is silent, for instance, on the parties’ position on the fate of LNG projects, the George Massey bridge, balanced budgets, potential road pricing in Metro Vancouver, and, perhaps most interestingly, what a potential new electoral system might look like. Voters deserve to know how a NDP- Green alliance would approach these issues.

It’s also hard to see how the Greens wouldn’t end up looking awfully orange after supporting the NDP for four years. Weaver’s votes on major confidence motions was his only bargaining chip. What leverage will he have over Horgan now that a deal’s been made, whether it’s to do with a matter that is covered in their agreement, or one that falls outside of it?

The agreement provides that the Greens “will neither move, nor vote nonconfidence during the term of this agreement, so long as the principle of good faith and no surprises has been observed.” Thus, if the NDP are given a chance to govern, Weaver and his caucus will have to vote for every confidence motion — budgetary policy, throne speeches and potentially others — going forward, or the lieutenant governor will call an election. Their arrangement also gives Weaver no seat in government ( Weaver has explicitly said this will not be a coalition government), and

the NDP will know he won’t remove his support at risk of triggering an election.

The agreement commits the NDP to consulting with the Green caucus on legislation, important policy and “broad budget parameters,” so the Greens might be able to exert influence over some bills. But since Weaver’s been clear that he won’t defeat a potential NDP government for four years, he’ll be stuck supporting their decisions on all the major items.

It might have been wiser for Weaver to offer neither the NDP nor Liberals his explicit support, let the legislature convene, and move forward on a vote by vote basis. In that situation, it would have been difficult for Premier Clark to do much of substance without explicitly bringing Weaver along. Weaver has undoubtedly had significant influence over behind- the- scenes discussions since May 9, but his influence on the big issues will only diminish going forward.

And while Weaver says he wants stable government for four years, this deal isn’t necessarily a recipe for that either. Even if we fast forward through the muddy waters of the coming days, and the NDP and Greens do form a governing alliance, the parties will together hold just 44 seats in the legislature, and the BC Liberals will hold 43. Remove one MLA as Speaker (likely from the NDP) and it’s 43-43, with the Speaker casting any tied votes in the Government’s favour ( the numbers for the NDP and Greens could get even dicier during the committee stage of a bill).

With that razor-thin margin, every one of the 44 NDP and Green MLAs would need to be chained to the legislature while the House is in session to avoid missing a vote. At best, their alliance might find their legislation defeated or significantly amended, and at worst they might find they’ve lost a confidence vote.

And while the Greens are a small party with limited resources that don’t want another election anytime soon, what about the NDP? After 16 years in opposition, they are surely desperate to get back into power. The agreement prevents the NDP from “request( ing) a dissolution of the Legislature during the term of the agreement, except following the defeat of a motion of confidence.” But being defeated on a confidence motion in relatively short order wouldn’t be the worst thing for their party.

There are more questions than answers about the future of politics here in B.C. But with all due respect to Weaver, he might have endorsed the worst possible arrangement for his party: diminished influence behind an NDP government that they have to support on the big issues, while still facing another election sooner than they’d like.

Samuel Oliphant is a communication consultant based in Vancouver, and former Press Secretary to Premier Christy Clark.