Orphaned voters and attack ads: BC United fallout continues

Voters who’ve long considered themselves centrists or centre-right are expressing a range of emotions a day after the leader of BC United pulled the party from October’s provincial election: relief, frustration, anger, and disorientation.

Voters who’ve long considered themselves centrists or centre-right are expressing a range of emotions a day after the leader of BC United pulled the party from October’s provincial election: relief, frustration, anger, and disorientation.

CTV News has spoken with multiple party insiders, loyalists, and candidates who paint a picture of a party controlled by Kevin Falcon, whose leadership style was top-down and not conducive to team-building, that’d run out of campaign funds and had little choice but to fold and throw his support behind the BC Conservatives.

“I didn't leave my party, my party left me,” said Peace River South MLA, Mike Bernier. “We basically found out when the rest of the province found out.”

He’s now deliberating on his political future, while long-time MLA and one-time interim BC Liberal leader Shirley Bond has pulled out of October’s election, and Todd Stone has retired from politics and thrown his support behind the BC Conservative candidate in Kamloops. 

“Ultimately it was difficult to maintain two right-of-centre parties in the province,” observed UBC political scientist, Stewart Prest. “But you can't have this kind of shotgun wedding between parties this close to an election and not have some fallout from the decision.”

Some BC United supporters had already defected to the BC Conservative party, frustrated with Falcon’s leadership and the disastrous re-branding from the BC Liberals that left voters confused. Others stuck it out, hoping for a miracle, but others saw the surge of right-wing populism sweeping the country and were resigned to their prospects. 

“Momentum is everything in politics as it is in sports and sometimes you just can't go against the tide and I saw that happening,” said Terry Lake, who held various cabinet portfolios as a BC Liberal and is now one of many frustrated fiscal conservatives who are socially progressive and feel adrift.