Early B.C. election unlikely: expert

BC United unveiled its election platform Tuesday, and while this may get voters thinking about the possibility of a snap election in the near future, one expert says this isn’t likely.

Hamish Telford, a political scientist at the University of the Fraser Valley, says it wouldn’t be in David Eby’s best interest to call an election earlier than planned.

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“On the core issues, I don’t think that Eby has a lot to show for his nine months in office,” Telford told CityNews. “He needs to make progress on some of those core files to show voters, ‘This is what we’ve done right now… I promised I would do that before, when I became leader, and I’m still promising it to you now without actually having delivered some results.'”

And because Eby has explicitly said on multiple occasions that he would not call an early election, “he would have a lot of explaining to do in the first days of an election campaign,” Telford said. “That would be the narrative for the first week of the campaign, quite possibly for the whole campaign.”

As for the competition, Telford says that what we are seeing in some of the most recent polling is that people are not familiar with BC United yet, and, ironically, it might actually benefit Eby to wait until that party finds its footing before calling an election.

Telford says the NDP could secure a victory if the BC United and Conservative parties split the vote. However, he adds the popularity of federal Tory Leader Pierre Poilievre has probably spilled over into the provincial Conservatives — making that split less likely.

“Poilievre has given good brand recognition, and Conservatives are motivated and enthusiastic right now,” he said. “We might be at a sort of a point where if BC United collapses … who comes in? That would be the BC Conservatives.”

However, while he says he doesn’t think Eby will call the snap election, Telford also says that NDP strategists could be looking at the numbers and seeing an opportunity.

“I could be proven wrong.”

The next provincial election is scheduled for Oct. 2024.