Politics of British Columbia
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Politics of British Columbia | |
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Parliament
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Provincial Court | |
Chief judge | Christopher E. Hinkson |
Provincial Court | |
Chief judge | Melissa Gillespie |
The Politics of British Columbia involve not only the governance of British Columbia, Canada, and the various political factions that have held or vied for legislative power, but also a number of experiments or attempts at political and electoral reform.
A
Legislature
The
Government
The Legislature plays a role in the election of governments, as the premier and Cabinet hold office by virtue of commanding the body's confidence. Per the tenants of responsible government, Cabinet ministers are almost always elected MLAs, and account to the Legislative Assembly.
Opposition
The second-largest party of
The Official Opposition is formally termed His Majesty's Loyal Opposition to signify that, though they may be opposed to the premier and Cabinet of the day's policies, they remain loyal to Canada, which is personified and represented by the King.[1]
History of politics in British Columbia
From BC's start as a province, BC used a mixture of the first past the post elections in single-member districts and multi-member districts where voters cast multiple votes (Block Voting). This was in use except for a small break in the 1950s, until the 1980s.
Prior to 1903, there were no political parties in British Columbia, other than at the federal level. One exception to this was the Nationalist Party, BC's first labour party founded in 1894. It elected an MLA in the 1894 and 1898 provincial election - Robert Macpherson.[2]
Sir
Since party politics were introduced to British Columbia, there have been a number of political parties which have controlled the government for more than ten years, including the
During the 1940s, the government was controlled by a coalition of the Liberals and Conservatives. Neither party had the electoral strength to form a majority, so a coalition was used as a means to prevent the B.C. Co-operative Commonwealth Federation (CCF) (the forerunner of the NDP) from taking power.
From 1972 to 1975, an NDP government led by
In western Canada (other than Alberta until 2015), typically politics have featured the CCF or NDP on the left and another party on the right. The present incarnation of the BC Liberal Party fulfills this role: the BC Liberal Party is neutral federally and derives its membership from the centre to the centre right. Since its takeover by supporters of Premier
After the introduction of partisan politics (1903–1952)
Government | Conservative | Liberal | Conservative | Liberal | Coalition | |||||||||
Party | 1903 | 1907 | 1909 | 1912 | 1916 | 1920 | 1924 | 1928 | 1933 | 1937 | 1941 | 1945 | 1949 | |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Conservative |
22 | 26 | 38 | 39 | 9 | 15 | 17 | 35 | 8 | 12 | ||||
Liberal |
17 | 13 | 2 | 36 | 25 | 23 | 12 | 34 | 31 | 21 | ||||
Liberal-Conservative coalition | 37 | 39 | ||||||||||||
Cooperative Commonwealth Federation | 7 | 7 | 14 | 10 | 7 | |||||||||
Socialist | 2 | 3 | 2 | 1 | ||||||||||
Labour |
1 | 3 | 3 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | |||||
Provincial Party | 3 | |||||||||||||
Non-Partisan Independent Group |
2 | |||||||||||||
Unionist |
1 | |||||||||||||
Social Democratic | 1 | |||||||||||||
People's Party | 1 | |||||||||||||
Independent Conservative | 1 | |||||||||||||
Independent Liberal | 2 | |||||||||||||
Independent Socialist | 1 | |||||||||||||
Independent | 1 | 3 | 2 | 1 | 1 | |||||||||
Total | 42 | 42 | 42 | 42 | 47 | 47 | 48 | 48 | 47 | 48 | 48 | 48 | 48 |
The Social Credit era (1952–1991)
Government | Social Credit | NDP | Social Credit | ||||||||||
Party | 1952 | 1953 | 1956 | 1960 | 1963 | 1966 | 1969 | 1972 | 1975 | 1979 | 1983 | 1986 | |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Social Credit | 19 | 28 | 39 | 32 | 33 | 33 | 38 | 10 | 35 | 31 | 35 | 47 | |
Cooperative Commonwealth Federation | 18 | 14 | 10 | 16 | |||||||||
New Democratic | 14 | 16 | 12 | 38 | 18 | 26 | 22 | 22 | |||||
Liberal |
6 | 4 | 2 | 4 | 5 | 7 | 5 | 5 | 1 | ||||
Progressive Conservative |
4 | 1 | 2 | 1 | |||||||||
Labour |
1 | 1 | 1 | ||||||||||
Independent | |||||||||||||
Total | 48 | 48 | 52 | 52 | 52 | 55 | 55 | 55 | 55 | 57 | 57 | 69 |
After Social Credit (1991 to present)
Government | NDP | Liberal | NDP | |||||||
Party | 1991 | 1996 | 2001 | 2005 | 2009 | 2013 | 2017 | 2020 | 2024
| |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
New Democratic | 51 | 39 | 2 | 33 | 35 | 34 | 41* | 57 | ||
Liberal |
17 | 33 | 77 | 46 | 49 | 49 | 43 | 28 | ||
Social Credit | 7 | |||||||||
Reform | 2 | |||||||||
Progressive Democratic Alliance | 1 | |||||||||
Green | 1 | 3* | 2 | |||||||
Independent | 1 | 1 | ||||||||
Total | 75 | 75 | 79 | 79 | 85 | 85 | 87 | 87 |
Electoral reform
Recall and initiative
British Columbia was the first province in Canada with recall-election and initiative legislation. These measures applied following the 1991 referendum.[3]
Only one recall petition was ever successful: that compelling MLA Paul Reitsma to resign his seat in 1998 – hours before he would have been removed from office.
Fixed election dates
British Columbia was the first province in Canada to institute fixed election dates. Previously, British Columbia elections were like most parliamentary jurisdictions, which only require an election within a specified period of time (being five years in all jurisdictions of Canada).
Alternative voting systems
1950s to the 1980s
By the 1950s, the Liberal-Conservative coalition had begun to fall apart. One of the last acts of the coalition government was to adopt the
Under this system single-member districts and preferential voting was used. Rather than voting for one candidate by marking an X on their ballots, electors ranked their choices of candidates by placing numbers next to the names of the candidates on the ballot. If a candidate received an absolute simple majority of votes, that candidate would be elected. If not, the candidate with the fewest votes was dropped and the second choices marked on the candidate's ballots were allocated among the remaining candidates. This procedure was repeated until a candidate received a majority of votes.
The result was the election of enough candidates of the new Social Credit party to form a Socred
The Socred minority government lasted only nine months. The Alternate Voting system was again employed for the ensuing general election. The result was a Socred majority. During this term of office, the Socreds abolished the alternative voting system and returned the province to the traditional voting system, a system that used both single-member districts and multi-member districts elected with a block voting system, both using first past the post system.[citation needed]
This mixed multiple-member and single-member district system with Block voting, was abolished in the 1980s, bringing single-member FPTP into use consistently.
2000s
In 2004,
2010s
In 2017 election, the BC NDP campaigned on the promise to hold a referendum on switching to a electoral system of proportional representation. A referendum was held in the subsequent year with two questions on the ballot. The first question was a binary choice between the current first past the post electoral system and a proportional representation electoral system. The second question asked citizens to rank three specific types of proportional representation: dual-member proportional representation, mixed-member proportional representation, and rural–urban proportional representation. If a majority of citizens preferred proportional representation over first past the post, this second question would determine which specific type of proportional representation the province would adopt. In the end, the second question was moot as voters decicively chose the familiar first past the post system (61.3%) over the unfamiliar proportional representation (38.7%).[4] After the results of the referendum were released (and even during the referendum campaign), critics suggested that a major reason that proportional representation was defeated was the complexity of the second ballot question.[5] Although the general public was knowledgeable enough to understand the difference between first past the post and proportional representation, the subtle and numerous differences between dual-member proportional representation, mixed-member proportional representation, and rural–urban proportional representation were less easy to understand, motivating voters to stick with the electoral system.[6]
See also
- Outline of government and politics of British Columbia
- Executive Council of British Columbia
- Legislative Assembly of British Columbia
- List of political parties in British Columbia
- List of British Columbia general elections
- List of premiers of British Columbia
- Council of the Federation
- Politics of Canada
- Political culture of Canada
References
- ^ Schmitz, Gerald (December 1988), The Opposition in a Parliamentary System, Ottawa: Queen's Printer for Canada, archived from the original on 25 April 2009, retrieved 21 May 2009
- ^ Encyclopedia of BC, p. 486
- ^ "Electoral History of British Columbia Supplement, 1987–2001" (PDF). Elections BC. March 2002. p. 60. Archived from the original (PDF) on 2007-10-09. Retrieved 2008-01-02.
- ^ "2018 Referendum Voting Results". Elections BC.
- ^ "How the No side surged from behind to defeat proportional representation". vancouversun. Retrieved 2022-02-07.
- ^ Dhillon, Sunny (2018-05-30). "B.C. unveils its proposed question for voters in electoral-reform referendum". The Globe and Mail. Retrieved 2022-02-07.