Courtenay-Comox key to NDP's bid for a majority
Island constituency pivotal in last vote could be a major part of 2020 equation
The Courtenay-Comox constituency on Vancouver Island was pivotal to the B.C. NDP's minority government victory in 2017, and it remains a district to watch in 2020.
Polls suggest a trend favouring an NDP majority this time around, but the central-Island riding is one of four or five on the Island that political scientist Kimberly Speers says are in contention in the equation to form government.
“I think the one that ... is perhaps receiving the most attention is the seat in Courtenay-Comox,” Speers said, considering its recent history.
Courtenay-Comox is new as a riding, formed in the 2015 electoral redistribution from parts of the former Comox riding, which had been solidly B.C. Liberal since the 2001 landslide of former premier Gordon Campbell, with the return victory of Stan Hagen.
However, the seat flipped to the NDP in 2017 by a narrow 189-vote margin in a contest that required a judicial recount to decide.
That decision was pivotal to delivering NDP Leader John Horgan the 41 seats he needed to form a minority government, with the support of the Green party.
Fast forward to 2020, Speers said the NDP needs to keep those 41 seats, plus add at least three to form a majority, and while polls look favourable, the Liberals are “really going out to that Courtenay-Comox seat to win it back.”
NDP candidate Ronna-Rae Leonard, a former three-time Courtenay city councillor, is running again, benefiting from the name recognition that comes with that, Speers said, along with Horgan's popularity as the leader guiding the province through the COVID-19 pandemic.
“People may find some comfort in kind of knowing the known and not voting for the unknown,” Speers said. And at this point, she's doubtful that Horgan's snap call for an early election is “going to be a ballot-box question.”
The riding's 2020 race is a narrower field than it was in 2017, which saw a Conservative candidate, Leah Catherine McCulloch, draw 2,201 votes. Leonard won with 10,886 votes, but Liberal runner-up Jim Benninger took 10,697.
“Where do those (Conservative) folks go if they're going to vote again?” Speers said. “Is that enough to get a Liberal win?”
This round's Liberal standard-bearer, 36-year-old industrial manager Brennan Day, isn't taking that for granted, though he understands the strategic importance of the constituency.
“Courtenay-Comox is probably one of the most divided ridings on the Island, in terms of being winnable,” Day said.
“We do have very strong support, and unfortunately last time it was a near miss.”
He said the issues he hears the most about in COVID-19-safe interactions with voters relate to pandemic recovery, community safety related to increasing urbanization of the riding and seniors care.
Day said he has a little extra support from the party in terms of a platform heavy on promises to seniors, an important factor in the riding, which has helped the Liberals make up “a ton of ground” this time.
“It really depends on election night,” Day said.
“I don't know where we are right now.”
The region has been “a real bellwether” in terms of provincial trends, Leonard said, which is a trend she is hopeful will hold in 2020, considering she has 3½ years of the government's record to run on.
The former Comox riding was held by NDP MLAs through the 1990s, before being held by Hagen as a Social Credit MLA through their governments in the 1980s.
“My team and myself are working hard to earn every vote,” Leonard said.
However, the B.C. Green candidate, Gillian Anderson, a longtime conservation advocate and volunteer, is counting on previous NDP voters disillusioned by government decisions on the Site C dam and climate issues such as LNG development to come her way.
“I'm running into a fair number of NDP voters who are telling me that they feel, as I do, so betrayed,” Anderson said.
In 2017, Green candidate Ernie Sellentin was a distant third in the race with 5,351 votes, so theoretically Anderson has a lot of ground to make up, even in a party re-energized by leader Sonia Furstenau's debate performances.
Anderson said she is running to win, but “every vote that the Green party gets sends a message to the mainstream politicians that their way of thinking about B.C., that old way of, you know, `Log it, dam it, mine it,' those days are over.”