WILKINSON’S CHALLENGE IS TO BE AGENT OF CHANGE
B.C. Liberal voters sent a strong message about what they were looking for in a leader through the first three rounds of balloting at the convention that concluded early Saturday evening.
Finishing first in round one was Dianne Watts, the former Surrey mayor and federal Conservative MP, who only joined the party last May. Finishing second was Michael Lee, the rookie MLA from Vancouver-Langara.
Together the two outsiders captured 47 per cent of the point count under the system adopted by the B.C. Liberals to equalize voting strength among the province’s individual ridings.
The duo held their one-two lead through subsequent rounds, topping out with a combined 54 per cent at the end of the third counting of the ballots.
Thus, to that point, party members were signalling a preference for two candidates who had no role in the faltering last term of Liberal government, the failed re-election strategy that saw the party lose 10 seats and its legislative majority, or last June’s embarrassing attempt to persuade the lieutenant-governor to order a second election.
The candidates with a hand in those debacles — former cabinet ministers Andrew Wilkinson, Todd Stone and Mike de Jong — ran third, fourth and fifth in the first round, the latter two dropping off in the second and third.
But in the fourth round came a dramatic turn. Insider Wilkinson picked up enough support from his ex-cabinet colleague dropouts to climb past Lee into second place. Just barely: the gap between the two was about a third of a percentage point.
Then in the final showdown he leaped past Watts to win it all, 53 per cent of the points to her 47, a larger margin than the four points that separated Christy Clark from loser Kevin Falcon in the leadership vote seven years ago.
But Clark led that contest through every round, as is more often the case when political parties use preferential balloting. (The preferential ballot is not the same as proportional representation and no guarantee of proportionality, though you wouldn’t know it from the PR advocates confusing the two systems in comments on the Liberal leadership vote.)
Post mortems on how Wilkinson managed to overcome Watts were necessarily tentative Saturday because the Liberals did not release voting details on a riding by riding basis.
But the word from the Watts camp was that her campaign had recruited many thousands of new members but faltered when it came to getting them to vote. Apparently fewer than half of the Watts recruits actually turned out in the three days of balloting.
Some Watts supporters were surprised at the way the voting broke when Lee dropped out. Instead of his support going to the other outsider, it went to insider Wilkinson by a two-toone margin.
More than one Liberal outsider drew attention to the fact that Lee’s organizer in the South Asian community was Sukh Dhaliwal, a longtime federal Liberal and no fan of the Conservative Watts. His recruits may well have been instructed to make their second choice anyone but Watts.
The other standout factor in the outcome was the overall weakness of the field. Watts ran a poor campaign and bombed many times on the public platform.
The ever-charming and provocative Sam Sullivan entered to raise issues, not win, and finished sixth, which is probably where he expected to be.
De Jong, try as he might, couldn’t persuade most voters that the second-longest serving member of caucus and the finance minister in the last government could represent change. He finished fifth, one place lower than in the 2011 leadership.
Todd Stone might have made it to the final round, had he been truthful about the bogus membership scandal that had embroiled his campaign (his denials notwithstanding) as far back as Jan. 12. Instead he ran fourth. By quitting immediately as premier, instead of sticking around for a year or so as Opposition leader, Christy Clark gave experienced candidates from the last government an advantage over newcomers.
The rookie MLA Lee, in particular, suffered from the lack of an opportunity to prove himself in the house before seeking the leadership. Still, he managed to hold second place for three rounds of voting. Had he managed to hang on for a fourth, he might have been the one to overcome Watts in the final showdown.
Might have beens notwithstanding, the outcome, far from delivering what party members seemed to be looking for in the early rounds, put the leadership in the hands of a former cabinet minister who was also the oldest candidate in the race.
Wilkinson’s first challenge is to show change by remaking the lineup of critics in the legislature and commencing the longer process of recruiting a fresh and more diverse slate of candidates for the next election. Staff changes are warranted as well.
The second is for him to find a balance point for his own overbearing personality, which was on display more than once during the leadership race and seldom to flattering effect.
But perhaps he can take a lesson from John Horgan, whose transformation from a frustrated and self-sabotaging Opposition leader to happy warrior premier is one of the most remarkable I have seen.
The premier, in a nice touch, welcomed the new leader of the Opposition to the political arena Sunday evening. In return, Wilkinson might inquire about the services of Horgan’s anger management counsellor.