SNC fallout looms over battle in B.C. riding
Wilson-Raybould’s rivals in Vancouver-Granville try to capitalize on scandal
VANCOUVER— The newly vindicated Jody Wilson-Raybould is heading into a free-for-all fight to keep her riding of Vancouver-Granville this fall, when even a single seat could sway the balance of power among federal parties.
Rivals of the now-Independent MP — including her former constituency assistant — are hoping that vote-splitting on the left of the political spectrum can work to their advantage in October.
“It’s going to be crazy,” said Mario Canseco, president of Vancouver polling firm Research Co.
Wilson-Raybould’s former party, the federal Liberals, suffered a blow on Wednesday with the release of a report from Canada’s ethics commissioner. The report backed up WilsonRaybould’s assertion that the prime minister acted inappropriately when he asked her to intervene in the prosecution of Quebec engineering firm SNCLavalin.
Wilson-Raybould resigned her cabinet position over the controversy and was later ejected from the Liberal caucus.
Wilson-Raybould is a strong contender in the riding, Canseco said, but B.C. could be an important battleground for the Liberals.
The long-awaited Arbutus Line, a proposed light-rail project, is slated to run along the western border of VancouverGranville. The Liberals would like nothing more than to “have a ribbon-cutting ceremony and remind peoplethis is what could happen if you send more Liberals to the House,” said Canseco.
“They definitely want to win the seat. Strategically it’s important because of the urban infrastructure policies, but also deep down they want to be able to win.”
The day before the release of the ethics report, the Liberals announced their nomination of Taleeb Noormohamed, a 42year-old tech entrepreneur, as their candidate to run against Wilson-Raybould in Vancouver-Granville.
In 2015, Wilson-Raybould secured the seat for the Liberals with about 44 per cent of the vote. Noormohamed, who ran unsuccessfully for the Liberals in North Vancouver in 2011, said his focus would be on housing affordability, transportation, climate change and health care. He added that the Liberals helping him campaign are uninterested in rehashing the SNC-Lavalin affair.
“What happened in the past, these types of questions that will be interesting to debate and discuss, are not the questions that are going to move the country forward,” he said. “I think that’s the priority.”
The Liberals have an economic advantage against WilsonRaybould going into the federal election. Candidates in Vancouver-Granville are allowed to spend $106,685 on their campaign; registered parties can spend $84,823 in the riding. Wilson Raybould must start from scratch as an Independent.
On Thursday, Wilson-Raybould told CBC’s The Early Edition that the money she had raised with the Liberals was taken away when she was ejected from the party. She said she was not deterred by the financial loss.
Her rivals in the riding — many of them newcomers to the political arena — are gearing up for a fight with the hope that a loss of faith in the Liberals in the wake of the SNC-Lavalin scandal, and the lack of resources available to an Independent candidate, might work in their favour.
“Some voters see (WilsonRaybould) as having put this nail in the Liberals’ coffin,” said NDP candidate Yvonne Hanson, a 24-year-old who has worked with a number of environmental organizations calling for a greater response to climate change.
Hanson said she supported the former justice minister in her stand against the Liberals, but her split from the party and decision to run as an Independent “does put the NDP in quite an advantage” because “it is more likely that voters will turn NDP than Conservative.”
The NDP placed second in the Vancouver-Granville riding in 2015, with about 27 per cent of the vote.
Alternatively, Naomi Chocyk — who worked as a constituency assistant in Wilson-Raybould’s office from 2016-2017 and is now running as the People’s Party of Canada candidate — said that voters’ concerns about Wilson-Raybould’s ability to represent them as an Independent might factor into a win for right-leaning parties.
“There’s many people who have been skeptical because she doesn’t have national representation ... They are concerned about what that means for them,” said Chocyk, who is completing her undergraduate degree in political science and international relations.
Chocyk said she always had right-leaning political viewpoints and was not a Liberal in her time at Wilson-Raybould’s office.
Zach Segal, who is running for the Conservative party after working as a staffer in Ottawa, said that while “people have a lot of respect for her” as an Independent, Wilson-Raybould would “have no party leader and no face time with the prime minister.”
Segal said the scandal has “showed voters that Justin Trudeau is not as advertised,” adding that voters feel “let down” by the Liberals.
The other candidate running in Vancouver-Granville is the Green party’s Louise Boutin, who could not immediately be reached for comment.