Of all the people keeping an eye on what happened at the B.C. New Democratic Party leadership convention Sunday – while watching the Vancouver Canucks playoff game – few had as much at stake in the outcome of the race as Premier Christy Clark.
Of the three leading candidates for the NDP’s top job, Mike Farnworth looked, on paper, to be her toughest potential opponent. John Horgan, the Irish charmer, was a wild card, a relative unknown outside of Vancouver Island who impressed many with his high energy campaign.
Adrian Dix was the NDP candidate who would create the clearest choice between New Democrats and Ms. Clark’s governing Liberal Party during a general election campaign. And privately, he was the candidate Ms. Clark hoped would prevail – although she would never make that preference known publicly.
Soon after suppertime, Ms. Clark would know the identity of her opponent: Adrian Dix. And he wasted no time telling New Democrats that he’s ready for a rough-and-tumble campaign against the Premier that will offer British Columbians starkly different visions of the future.
Leadership conventions are almost always a time of renewal for a political party. And also a time of hope, particularly for parties that have been in the political wilderness as long as B.C. New Democrats.
But inevitably, leadership contests leave deep disappointment and hurt feelings. And sometimes the schisms and divides that are created by the outcome of a leadership battle can take years to heal over. And on that front, this NDP leadership contest is no different.
That will be one of Mr. Dix’s first tasks as leader: to get all New Democrats to rally around his ideas for the party and province.
He knows there is a powerful force within the NDP that did not subscribe to the tenets articulated in his policy platform, which ideologically was certainly further to the left than his two main challengers.
Mr. Farnworth and Mr. Horgan both offered more middle-of-the-road routes to electoral success. Mr. Farnworth, in particular, preached a more moderate policy formula that gave business an equal place at the table with labour. It was a plan that caught the eye of former NDP leader Mike Harcourt, who said recently that Mr. Farnworth offered the party the best chance of winning a provincial election.
And, in fact, that is exactly what most of the polls done during the NDP leadership race showed.
Mr. Farnworth gave the party the best shot of making a fight against Christy Clark competitive, although all the polls showed the New Democrats losing to the Liberals if an election were held now. But Mr. Horgan and Mr. Dix placed well back of Mr. Farnworth.
Which is just one of the reasons that Ms. Clark must be rejoicing today.
I’m sure the first polls that surface after this decision will not be overly encouraging to Mr. Dix, who, perhaps unfairly, is often described as a hardened ideologue. This likely has to do with his decision to target banks and large corporations for tax increases.
You can almost see the Liberal attack ads now. Ms. Clark is sure to use Mr. Dix’s agenda as a scare tactic. A vote for Mr. Dix and the NDP is a vote to kill jobs in B.C. An effective scare-mongering campaign might even spook arch-conservatives from marking a ballot in favour of a re-energized Conservative party under former federal MP John Cummins.
On the other hand, some New Democrats believe that Mr. Dix’s vision will speak to tens of thousands of disenfranchised voters who have felt none of the political parties speak for them.
Mr. Dix’s victory certainly sets up a compelling election campaign, which could well be under way before the end of the year.
