Geoff Russ: Another mushy centrist B.C. party is how David Eby governs forever

Winners and HomeSense have barely started stocking Halloween merchandise on their shelves, and there is talk of zombie revivals in British Columbia.

Like some mad scientists and taxidermists, the nostalgists for the dead B.C. Liberal Party are trying to take advantage of the crisis unfolding in the provincial Conservative party. Two years ago, the B.C. Conservatives famously bludgeoned the B.C. Liberals (by then going by BC United) into the dust and replaced them as the Official Opposition.

Now, with rookie leader Kerry-Lynne Findlay at the helm for less than three months, the party is apparently disintegrating as veteran MLAs and longtime staff are either being pushed out or officially leaving of their own accord. There are rumours of the KLF-led party being reconfigured along the lines of personal loyalty, usefulness and ideology rather than broad coalition-building.

Those unwilling to give KLF a chance to unseat David Eby’s NDP government are seeking revenge. According to radio host and former B.C. Liberal MLA Jas Johal, there was a great gathering of “Harper Conservatives, Carney Liberals, Horgan New Democrats” in the basement of a White Spot restaurant to plan an alternative, new “free enterprise” party.

Four promises will anchor this envisioned party: economic growth, controlled spending, resource development, improved affordability and nothing more. However, that would be akin to drinking the same medicine that made the non-left sick in the first place.

Johal described this coalition of “Harper Conservatives, Carney Liberals, Horgan New Democrats” as “Three tribes that used to spend their weekends attacking each other, now in the same room asking whether they want to win or want to be right.”

For starters, Harper left office in 2015, John Horgan (Eby’s more impressive predecessor) became B.C. premier in 2017, and Mark Carney became Liberal leader and PM in 2025. These are not former enemies. Rather, they are three labels used to segment a glorified focus group whose members share a passion for White Spot’s famous Pirate Paks.

People obviously cross partisan lines, but the label “Harper Conservative” in 2025 simply refers to some right-of-centre Canadians who can advise on taxes and nothing else. That is not actually a political tribe, as some of those same people are now “Carney Liberals.”

Also, a clichéd, cookie-cutter platform of growth, controlled spending, resources, and affordability is not very sturdy. Very few governments will ever actually rein in spending anymore, and what sort of ambitious politician will not promise growth and affordability? There are depressingly few examples of either promise being fulfilled in Canada as well.

At the end of the day, Canadian elections tend to be personality contests right now. People liked Horgan and like Carney because both passed the “beer test”; Carney, in particular, harnessed perverse Liberal nationalism. All of it was emotion, which former B.C. Conservative leader John Rustad failed to convey on most occasions. Most importantly, Carney has an impressive paper résumé as an international central banker to go along with his charisma and aura. Who in B.C. can come close to matching that? (There is perhaps only one, but that will be revealed later, if at all.)

Furthermore, the economy cannot be divorced from culture or the war for the latter. In B.C., the biggest issue in the province until KLF assumed the leadership was the ongoing effects of the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples Act (DRIPA), which is intimately tied up with the “land back” movement and other far-left ideas. These same ideas helped inspire equally inane policies such as “safe supply,” the decriminalization of hard drugs, and rash gender transitions for children.

Is the new centrist Pirate Pak Party (the PPP?)  going to simply ignore DRIPA and let the NDP apparatus of NGOs and other non-government elements continue to run roughshod over the province? This would mean accepting all the radical ideas of the NDP and freezing them in place, at best.

There have actually been multiple failed examples of this in recent Canadian history. The Canadian Future Party, envisioned as a “not left, not right” alternative meant to fill the supposed gap in the centre in the 2025 federal election, fielded just 19 candidates and received only 3,123 votes.

B.C. United/Liberals tried to pretend that the relative cultural and social harmony of the early 2000s, which made it easy to focus only on the economy, still existed in 2024. CentreBC, led by former B.C. Liberal MLA Steve Bernier, is now making a similar pitch.

Recent B.C. Conservative refugees Peter Milobar and Ian Paton have announced that they intend to form another moderate party for the “politically homeless.” It is unknown whether they plan to lead the Pirate Pak Party, but it would be unsurprising.

The success of the original B.C. Liberals depended on conditions that have long since faded into history. Their near-monopoly on the anti-NDP vote was predicated on relatively muted cultural conflict and the absence of a true alternative for conservative voters in the prince. Then, as now, their support was essential to forming a government.

The right wing cannot be treated as an embarrassing accessory to a free-enterprise coalition, and this is even more salient in an era of revived right-wing populism. Conservative voters provide members, donations and, most importantly, votes across the province. Although outnumbered in urban areas, those are still the largest numeric well-springs of non-left voters.

If this new “free-enterprise” party believes it can demand right-wing votes while condescending to those same people, it will need a great deal more than luck to succeed.

Findlay’s current difficulties do not vindicate stale, millenarian centrism. The case against her leadership has centred on ethics, hirings and an inability to hold a broad coalition together.

Conservatism did not cause seven MLAs to leave caucus in half a month, nor did it necessitate scandalous senior appointments.

B.C. certainly does need a broad, anti-NDP coalition, but that will be achieved by bringing factions together without declaring the convictions of its largest blocks invalid, outdated, or unwanted. How can such a party help drive the economy without dealing with DRIPA or promise affordability without reckoning with immigration, wage suppression and the other factors that drive unaffordability?

Without reconciling that, this new “free-enterprise” project will be scarcely more than garden variety donors and a pleasant logo. B.C. needs something far better, and as it currently stands, a salvaged and reinvigorated provincial Conservative party is the best vehicle for that.

National Post