Autumn election amid a pandemic a reckless idea
B.C. needs leadership, solidarity — not politics, writes Alex Shiff.
In recent weeks, it has become clear that the B.C. NDP government is strongly considering triggering an early fall election. As we enter a period that many epidemiologists have said could be the most treacherous of the COVID-19 pandemic, an early election would be incredibly reckless and dangerous.
With a worsening pandemic, can we risk a five-week campaign where the government goes into “caretaker mode,” where bureaucrats steer the ship without making any significant decisions, as MLAs and ministers are solely focused on campaigning?
Bolstered by strong polling numbers and high approval levels for Premier John Horgan and the provincial health officer, Dr. Bonnie Henry, the NDP government is positioned to run the next election largely as a referendum on its management of the pandemic.
Due to B.C.'s early success in responding to the coronavirus pandemic during the spring and early summer, many British Columbians began to believe that we were somehow exceptional — that the insidiousness of the virus didn't apply to us and long-term mitigation efforts wouldn't be required like elsewhere in the world.
Indeed, many British Columbians still seem to believe that the province has continued to fare well in our pandemic response compared with other Canadian jurisdictions.
Unfortunately, that is no longer accurate, with British Columbia now having the second highest active case count per capita of any province in Canada, behind only Alberta.
Most British Columbians are shocked to hear this, and many still believe that our neighbouring provinces are in a much worse position than we are. This cognitive dissonance combined with low levels of mask use and erosion of social distancing, as evidenced by increases in large gatherings of young people, is a recipe for a public health disaster in the winter and fall.
Sadly, due to low levels of local news consumption, most British Columbians are unaware of the recent dangerous trajectory British Columbia is on. The narrative of B.C. exceptionalism in the fight against COVID was established early on in the pandemic, and a deeply set narrative ingrained in the minds of voters is very challenging to break.
Recent mailers from B.C. NDP MLAs to their constituents feature Bonnie Henry prominently and seem to show the extent to which the government wants voters to judge them politically based on their management of the pandemic.
In order to achieve electoral success, the B.C. NDP will have to perpetuate the narrative among voters that British Columbia has navigated the pandemic better than our provincial neighbours, and only time will tell how that story ends.
Voting itself will likely occur safely and efficiently under the watchful eye of non-partisan Elections B.C., which in recent years has increasingly implemented policies to make advance and absentee voting easier and more accessible. However, the ability of voters to actually engage with politicians on the campaign train will be extremely limited — especially for seniors and voters from marginalized communities who lack access to technological tools like Zoom that are critical to campaigning in a virtual world.
Those who favour an early election for partisan purposes will likely point to the recent provincial election in New Brunswick, which occurred during the pandemic. This is, of course, a disingenuous comparison as New Brunswick currently has two active cases and has largely contained the coronavirus. British Columbia is sadly on a very different path.
No matter which party is in power, we need a principled government that will be honest with British Columbians about the stark realities we face. We need a government that is spending all its energy managing the crisis, not one that is in caretaker mode.
A fall election in the midst of a worsening pandemic would inject politics at a time when British Columbians need solidarity and leadership.
Many British Columbians began to believe that we were somehow exceptional.