What can PM learn from B.C. vote?
Horgan's big win shows pandemic voting can work
OTTAWA• B.C. Premier John Horgan took a risk by calling an election in the middle of a pandemic, but it paid off handsomely on Saturday as the B.C. NDP secured a majority government and won the most seats in their party’s history.
The election also marks the second time this fall that a provincial government has expanded a minority government into a majority, after New Brunswick Premier Blaine Higgs and his Progressive Conservatives won 27 of 49 ridings. In Saskatchewan, meanwhile, polls show Scott Moe’s government is on track to hold on to their majority government in Monday’s election.
The smashing success so far of incumbent provincial governments during the COVID-19 pandemic has undoubtedly not been missed in the Prime Minister’s Office, where Justin Trudeau has already been playing election hardball with the opposition. Last week the Liberals declared a Conservative motion to create an “anti-corruption committee” was a confidence vote; they won it thanks to NDP and Green Party support, thus avoiding a snap election call.
Even so, the prospect of another federal election in the near future is looking more and more likely. If it happens, here are some lessons Trudeau might take from Horgan’s big victory.
IT'S GOOD TO BE AN INCUMBENT — IF VOTERS LIKE YOUR PANDEMIC RESPONSE
The B.C. NDP entered the election with polls showing they were in comfortable majority territory, and B.C.’s relatively successful pandemic response is likely a major reason why.
The federal Liberals are also leading in the polls. CBC's Poll Tracker, which weights all federal polling, currently shows the Liberals nationally at 36.4 per cent, the Conservatives at 30.5 per cent, the NDP at 17.9 per cent and the Bloc Québécois at 6.9 per cent.
But the national number masks regional disparities. The Conservatives thump the Liberals in Alberta but are far behind in populous Ontario, Quebec and B.C. As it stands, the Liberals are positioned well to hold or increase their seats.
Furthermore, in the latest weekly polling by Leger Marketing for the Association for Canadian Studies, 54 per cent said they trusted Trudeau's leadership despite the second wave of COVID-19, including 62 per cent of respondents in Ontario and a majority everywhere else outside the prairies. The numbers also showed Trudeau scored well on trust with respondents who said they feared catching COVID-19.
Jack Jedwab, president of the Association for Canadian Studies, said he believes an election call would be risky, but overall most voters appear likely to reward Trudeau for his government's handling of the pandemic. He pointed out that U. S. President Donald Trump's poor pandemic response is the biggest reason for his weak election position now.
“If we look both at Horgan and south of the border, I think the lesson to be extracted from this is that as long as the Liberals are seen as addressing the segments of the population worried about getting COVID — which is a majority — there's political opportunity for them for sure,” Jedwab said.
OPPORTUNISM CAN PAY OFF
Along with Horgan's rosy poll numbers, he was also squaring off against two rookie leaders: Andrew Wilkinson of the B.C. Liberals and Sonia Furstenau of the B.C. Green Party.
The election call was particularly rough timing for Furstenau, who had became leader just a week before it. The Greens were not able to field a full slate of candidates, and Furstenau had no time to grow into the job. The Greens won three seats, the same number as in 2017.
Trudeau's main opposition, Erin O'Toole, won the Conservative leadership just two months ago. The sooner Trudeau calls an election, the less time O'Toole has to get organized and introduce himself to voters.
There is at least one big difference between Horgan's situation and Trudeau's, however. When Horgan called the election, it had been more than three years since the last one. Trudeau was only re-elected a year ago, and voters may not appreciate returning to the ballot box so quickly.
PANDEMIC VOTING DIFFICULT, BUT FEASIBLE
There was much talk ahead of the B.C. election that the heavy use of mail-in ballots — at least half a million are expected — could delay the results for two to three weeks. But the election was called quickly on Saturday night, as the NDP were simply too far ahead in too many ridings for the overall result to be affected.
Although the three provinces that have held elections this fall — New Brunswick, British Columbia and Saskatchewan — have not been hit by COVID-19 as bad as Quebec and Ontario, they have still shown that pandemic election campaigns can be pulled off without major problems.
Canada's Chief Electoral Officer Stéphane Perrault told MPs this week that a federal election during the pandemic would add $50 million in costs, but Elections Canada can make it work.
“A national election is a logistical feat in the best of circumstances, and these are not the best of circumstances,” Perrault said. But he said he was ready for a snap election if it had been called last week. “It would have, in my view, been a successful election,” he said.