B.C. Liberals excel in getting large donations
‘Best government money can buy,’ says advocacy group
In the run-up to the May 9 provincial election, the B.C. Liberals are counting on big money to help bring them a win, despite Premier Christy Clark’s repeated claims to the contrary.
Clark has defended her province’s political donation system, which has no limit on donation size and permits people who don’t live in B.C. — and even those who don’t live in Canada — to donate. The federal government and most other provinces have strict donation caps and only allow Canadians to contribute.
A National Post analysis of B.C. political donations from 2005 to 2017 found that 25.12 per cent of donations to the Liberal party come from those giving $20,000 or more. Over half of all money raised by the Liberals, or 54.05 per cent, comes from donations over $5,000. During a similar period (2005 to 2016), 19.59 per cent of the B.C. NDP’s money came from donations over $20,000, and 30.45 per cent came from donations over $5,000.
The Wall family donated over $400,000 to the Liberals in 2016 alone. Real estate magnate Peter Wall, and his nephew Bruno Wall also contributed to Christy Clark’s leadership race in 2011, and have been big donors since then.
The NDP’s largest donations come from unions. The biggest donor was the B.C. Government and Services Employees Union, which gave $2.18 million between 2005 to 2015, followed by United Steelworkers at $1.67 million.
“B.C. has a best-government-money-can-buy political donations system that violates the key democratic principle of one-person, onevote, because it allows businesses, unions and other interest groups, and wealthy individuals, even from other countries, to make donations that are much larger than an average voter can afford,” said Duff Conacher, co-founder of the advocacy group Democracy Watch.
In contrast with Clark, NDP leader John Horgan has promised to ban union and corporate donations if he wins the province’s May 9 election.
The National Post analysis shows the average Liberal donation in B.C. is $1,260.80, about nine times more than the NDP’s $139.06. And while the vast majority — 87 per cent — of the NDP’s donations come from those giving under $200, that number is just 29 per cent for the Liberals.
In 2016, the Liberals brought in significant sums from numbered corporations. If the NDP win the provincial election they intend to ban numbered corporations from donating.