NDP leads Courtenay-Comox with half of absentee ballots counted

The fate of B.C.’s next government continues to hang in the balance of a handful of voters in Courtenay-Comox after a new round of absentee ballots counted Tuesday gave the provincial NDP a tentative 101-vote lead.

The New Democrats and Liberals swapped control of the key riding back and forth Tuesday, as Elections B.C. officials counted roughly half of the 2,077 absentee ballots. The counting continues today.

The increasing likelihood of a close result could mean British Columbians are in for another two weeks of court applications and judicial recounts before the final results are known.

Courtenay-Comox will determine whether Premier Christy Clark’s Liberal government can obtain a 44-seat majority in the 87-seat legislature or remain at its 43-seat minority status, at risk of being defeated through a cooperative effort by the NDP and Green party.

The mid-Island riding was won by the NDP’s Ronna-Rae Leonard on May 9 by nine votes. That margin widened to 13 votes with a recount of ballots Monday, and then flipped to favour Liberal candidate Jim Benninger by three votes early Tuesday before tilting back toward Leonard by 101 votes at the end of the day.

The slim margin means the riding could go to a judicial recount, where a judge would examine and rule upon the validity of each disputed ballot. That recount would occur automatically if one candidate won by less than about 60 votes, or if there’s an application by someone claiming the ballots weren’t properly accepted or counted.

The timelines are dictated by B.C.’s Election Act, which says a judicial-recount application must be made within six days of the final count, and then could take another eight days to schedule. The recount itself usually takes two days. Even after that, candidates have two days to ask the Court of Appeal to count again.

Each of B.C.’s last three elections had a judicial recount.

In 2013, the NDP’s Selina Robinson saw her 41-vote victory in Coquitlam-Maillardville upheld by a judge. In 2009, a judge declared Independent Vicki Huntington defeated then-Liberal cabinet minister Wally Oppal by 32 votes after a recount of the ballots in Delta South. And in 2005, Liberal Lorne Mayencourt saw his 11-vote victory in Vancouver-Burrard authorized upon judicial recount.

Most of the province’s 87 ridings concluded Elections B.C.’s final-count process Tuesday. While the margins of victory shifted slightly in several cases (the Liberals’ margin of victory in Coquitlam-Burke Mountain shrunk from 268 votes to 87, for example), none resulted in a change from election night. The Liberals remained with 43 seats, the NDP 41 and the Greens three seats, pending the results of Courtenay-Comox.

The election’s popular vote did tighten to almost a tie, with the Liberals at 40.38 per cent, compared with 40.25 per cent for the NDP and 16.85 per cent for the Greens. That compares with almost 46 per cent for the Liberals in 2013, 42 per cent for the NDP and eight per cent for the Greens.

Meanwhile, back at the legislature, more than 50 activists representing eight community groups presented a petition of 25,000 signatures from British Columbians calling on the Green party and NDP to co-operate to govern.

NDP MLA-elect Carole James and Green MLA-elect Sonia Furstenau attended the rally to receive the petitions on behalf of their parties, but said little to update the ongoing talks between the NDP and Greens on sharing power. The Greens have said they’re also negotiating with the Liberals to try to find common ground.

“It’s the people of B.C. sending a message,” Furstenau said. “And we carry on in discussions that we’re having and we take it from there.”