‘Yes’ side gains early spending advantage in electoral referendum

VICTORIA Advocates in favour of changing B.C.’s electoral system have an early spending advantage in this fall’s referendum.

Six of the eight organizations registered Thursday as third-party advertisers in the referendum are in favour of changing B.C. to proportional representation, meaning the “yes” side has the potential to outspend the “no” side in the opening stages of the campaign.

The Opposition B.C. Liberals, who oppose proportional representation, accused the “yes” side of splitting off into smaller groups to exploit what it called a “spending loophole” in the rules.

“The number of groups we presume will join the B.C. NDP and B.C. Greens in promoting the ‘yes’ side have registered separately instead of together,” said Liberal MLA Michael Lee.

“By doing that, they could have three times more money than the ‘no’ side at their disposal, to push their agenda.”

Elections B.C. announced Thursday the official proponent and opponent groups: the No B.C. Proportional Representation Society and Vote PR B.C. Each will get $500,000 from the government to promote its argument to the public, and be subject to a further $200,000 advertising limit, giving each society a total spending cap of $700,000.

However, some of the groups affiliated with Vote PR B.C. have splintered off to register as thirdparty advertisers, thereby obtaining their own separate $200,000 fundraising and spending cap.

Fair Vote Canada-B. C., which was a founding member of the Vote PR B.C. campaign, is now registered on its own.

LeadNow, a political action group that had also been involved in Vote PR B.C., has also broken off to register separately.

Under the referendum rules, the third-party advertisers are not allowed to coordinate their campaigns or share events and spending with the official Vote PR B.C. proponent group.

Spokesperson Maria Dobrinskaya said Vote PR B.C. has received legal advice and is “being very careful” to adhere to that separation.

Some events have already been cancelled and the groups have been told they can’t communicate directly with Vote PR B.C.

However, she also acknowledged the groups had been working together on strategies for months before the official start of the campaign period on July 1.

“Broadly, what the overall messaging will be and that kind of stuff, there’s been co-ordination and alignment around that,” said Dobrinskaya.

“But specific strategy on where we are running ads and when are we having events, the overall arc of the campaign, particularly around ad campaigns and field work, that has not been mapped out.”

The two registered third-party groups against PR — the B.C. Liberal Party and the KnowB4UVote. com Society, led by businessman Jim Shepard — have not been affiliated with the official ‘no’ side opponent group.

Shepard’s group has already been heavily spending on newspaper ads and robocalls.

More ‘no’ side advertisers could register before the mail-in ballot deadline of Nov. 30, thereby balancing out the race.

“I do think it’s early days and don’t think who is registered now is much of an indication of anything,” said Dobrinskaya. “I think people will be spending the rest of the summer mapping out the campaign.”