Clark adds an exclamation mark
For the first time in 21/2 years, Clark finds herself without an immediate electoral target and a pressing need to launch into another campaign.
As Premier Christy Clark basked in the glow of her fourth campaign victory in 30 months Wednesday evening, she readily acknowledged having run the electoral equivalent of a “marathon.”
“When you are in the middle of a marathon you don’t stand around and say, ‘ Gee, I’m so tired,’ ” she told reporters. “You say, ‘ I have got to keep my energy up. I’ve got to keep working so that I can get to the end and I can succeed.’ ”
A long, hard slog, even for someone who famously professes to have “politics in my blood” and who during a break from the game compared politics to an old boyfriend: “... and then a couple of years down the road you’re thinking ‘ God that guy was great! I miss him!’ and you pick up the phone and dial.”
That was before she gave up a promising career in radio and jumped back into the fray in December 2010 to seek the leadership of the B. C. Liberal party.
Four months of vigorous campaigning later, lacking the support of all but one Liberal MLA, she won the leadership on the third ballot and then only narrowly.
Sworn in as premier in midMarch by virtue of her leadership of the majority party in the legislature, she faced the immediate challenge of the long- standing parliamentary tradition that first ministers without seats in parliament are expected to seek one in short order.
She met the expectation in a May byelection in the vacated-by-her- predecessor constituency of Vancouver- Point Grey. Another narrow victory, however, and the first sign that the riding was lukewarm to her charms.
Next? Her first thought was to set sights on refreshing the B. C. Liberal mandate to govern, via an early general election.
However, by the end of that first summer as premier — after the failed campaign to rescue the harmonized sales tax from the wrath of the electorate in a referendum — she surrendered to the lack of enthusiasm among her own colleagues for an early trip to the ballot box. That only prolonged what became a perpetual campaign. For there was no escaping the dynamic that translated every move she made into a test of whether she could “turn it around” and secure a fourth mandate for the Liberals, a first for herself as premier.
Still, at the end of it, there was the big win in the May 14 general election, unprecedented in the way it confounded the expectations of most of the pollsters and pundits and more than a few Liberals.
The vindication would have been total, were it not for that one pesky detail of her losing her own seat in standoffish Point Grey.
She was indisputably premier, and had been since March 2011, never mind how many people — misunderstanding our political system — insisted she was not.
But neither could she escape the parliamentary convention that a premier cannot govern credibly for long without a seat of his or her own.
Hence the obligation for one more expedited trip to the polls.
Ben Stewart, fresh from winning a second term as MLA for Westside- Kelowna, resigned on the first day that he could do so. Despite rumours, started within his own family, that he was not happy to give up his seat, he demonstrated considerable grace by campaigning with enthusiasm for her to take over.
Clark, knowing she could ill afford to lose — there was ample precedent for a premier to seek a backup seat in a byelection but none for a premier needing a third chance to get into the house — avoided the mistakes she’d made in her byelection run in Point Grey.
She took part in all- candidates meetings and indicated she would try to represent the riding in the long run, if the voters were willing to entrust her with the honour. She made promises targeted specifically to the riding, too.
Nor did the party take anything for granted, flooding Kelowna with volunteers, ensuring a high turnout in the advance poll and an impressive finish on election day.
She led from the outset of the Elections B. C. tally and finished with 63 per cent of the popular vote, a higher share than Stewart in the general election, the easiest of the four wins that brought her this far.
So for the first time in 2 ½ years, Clark finds herself without an immediate electoral target and a pressing need to launch into another campaign.
But I’m indebted to Philip Till, the morning host on radio station CKNW and a former foreign correspondent, for reminding me what Margaret Thatcher said after one of her victories. “Celebrate tonight,” or words to that effect, “for tomorrow begins the campaign for the next election.”
Clark’s agenda is top- heavy with the need to implement an ambitious election platform: keeping the budget in balance, securing a long- term deal with teachers, and opening up the province to a liquefied natural gas industry as part of a broader agenda for job creation and economic growth. Plus there are those targeted promises she made in the course of persuading Kelowna to take a chance on again being represented by a premier.
As a proven master of the political game in this province, she’ll know as well as anyone that mandates evaporate quickly and there’s no avoiding the continual courtship of the electorate.