2008 By-Election Final Results

Posted November 12, 2008 by Sacha Peter
Category: News

The final count for the 2008 provincial by-elections are slightly different than the preliminary count given on election day. I am guessing this includes the advanced polling results. The NDP performed slightly better, while the BC Conservatives performed slightly worse compared to the preliminary results.

Vancouver-Burrard:
Herbert (NDP) 7,002 - 50.7% - Elected
Griffiths (BCL) 5,100 - 36.9%
Read (GRN) 742 - 5.3%
McLeod (BCC) 590 - 4.3%
Emery, M (BCM) 379 - 2.7%
Estimated Turnout: 23.5%

Vancouver-Fairview:
McGinn (NDP) 5,754 - 47.0% - Elected
MacDiarmid (BCL) 4,933 - 40.3%
Sterk (GRN) 900 - 7.4%
Hanni (BCC) 496 - 4.1%
Emery, J (BCM) 166 - 1.4%
Estimated Turnout: 27.3%

Predictions Made and Commentary
NDP to take Vancouver-Burrard - Successful - This really wasn’t in question. Herbert will easily take Vancouver-West End in the following 2009 election.

BC Liberals to take Vancouver-Fairview - Failed - I was surprised at the NDP’s relatively good performance in this riding, one would have thought that the BC Liberals’ candidate would have had more local credibility with her medical association. Vancouver-Fairview is right in the middle of “medical alley”, near the Cambie and 12th area. Perhaps the Canada Line construction fiasco cost the BC Liberals points locally in this area. McGinn will be in for a fight in 2009, as when the other 30% of the riding shows up to vote it won’t be nearly as positive for the NDP. Still, she can take good comfort in knowing that she did better than Gregor Robertson in 2005.

Vancouver-Burrard voter turnout 25%, Vancouver-Fairview voter turnout 30% - Successful - I’ll consider this close enough to be a successful prediction. Voter turnout was pathetically low, but this could be easily anticipated. It also tells you that the number of die-hard political junkies in each riding that will vote for anything is probably a constant number.

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Calm before the storm

Posted November 12, 2008 by Sacha Peter
Category: News

The news over the past 10 days has been so silent that you could hear a pin drop. The economic situation (with the stock markets appearing to drop 5% on a daily basis) has taken the whole continent by storm, and provincial jurisdiction matters have been on the back-burner.

The local news out there has mainly revolved around the municipal elections, and most of the ground-level troops have been there and not provincially active. After November 15, eyes will look around the provincial domain for the upcoming May 12 election.

In Vancouver, the Vision Vancouver vote will be a good proxy for NDP support, while the NPA vote will be a good proxy for BC Liberal support in the upcoming election. There will be a lot of data that can be mined.

I am projecting that Gregor Robertson will become the next mayor of Vancouver. The existing council has accumulated too much baggage, and although Robertson has shown himself to be politically stupid with respect to not paying for two zones on Translink, this has been completely erased by the $100 million loan scandal which will seat Robertson’s victory. Robertson has caught quite a wave of good luck this election.

Provincially, things start again with the November 20th opening of the Legislature for a very brief session to enact the Premier’s economic plan that was proposed in the televised address. Presumably there will be some more visibility on the specific measures in the legislation that is to be proposed.

There are two other tidbits worthy of mention.

One is that the federal Liberal leadership convention will be held in Vancouver, with the leader to be selected on May 2, 2009. This may have the effect of siphoning away some media attention on the provincial scene for a few days leading up to the convention. Bob Rae and Michael Ignatieff will be slugging away at each other at this point in a political cage match.

The second is that non-profit groups have up until Decmeber 1, 2008, to apply for some provincial funding to spread the worth with respect to the electoral reform referendum.

In the upcoming days, I will be creating riding-by-riding profiles where people can individually comment. The initial efforts will be concentrated on swing ridings.

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Municipalities offered an olive branch

Posted September 24, 2008 by Sacha Peter
Category: News

The government is (correctly, from a political standpoint) using this Federal election cycle to mitigate future negative news.

First is a press release (and details) concerning the partial mitigation of the senior executive pay issue. This forces Carole James and the NDP to use a more abstract and less politically catchy argument of “The pay scale still has a maximum of forty-something percent”. The deputy to the Premier, Jessica Macdonald, is also spending a few after-tax dollars of opportunity cost to prevent her from being a target of the NDP.

Today, there is the offering of an olive branch at the Union of the BC Municipalities (UBCM) meeting, where the province is offering to refund municipalities’ carbon taxes in exchange for the municipalities becoming carbon neutral by 2012.

It will be interesting to see how this plays out during the municipal election cycle - my quick take is that the province imposed a cost on the municipalities (via carbon taxes, of which the “revenue neutral” portion will not touch the local governments), and now the province is saying they will effectively take away the costs (in the form of a grant) as long as they are carbon neutral.

The only way I can see municipalities achieving the objective of carbon neutrality is a combination between operation and capital expenditures, but the bulk of the operational side will presumably by via purchasing carbon credits. Obviously, the municipalities have to model such costs - if it costs more to be carbon neutral than what they’re paying in carbon taxes, then there’s no point in doing this. If it costs less, then they will do it.

There was little detail in the press release and also no numbers associated with the cost to the province or the municipalities, so this one will play out further.

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Political lingo shift

Posted September 21, 2008 by Sacha Peter
Category: News

I noticed when Colin Hansen was on CKNW today, that he referred to the carbon tax (which I do not recall he ever mentioned by name) as the “pollution tax” or “a tax on pollution”.

This of course, is lifting Stephane Dion’s synonym for the carbon tax.

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Mayencourt to step down Monday

Posted September 5, 2008 by Sacha Peter
Category: By-Election, News

Lorne Mayencourt will apparently be resigning as MLA of Vancouver-Burrard on Monday, September 8, 2008.

Assuming the Chief Electoral Officer receipts the warrant (resignation notice) on the same day, this means that at the latest, a by-election has to be called by March 8, 2009, with an election date of April 6, 2009. April 6, 2009 is 36 days before the general election date of May 12, 2009.

As a general election is called 28 days in advance of the voting date, this means that there will be a by-election in Vancouver-Burrard before the 2009 general election.

Vancouver-Burrard so happened to be the narrowest of victories for the BC Liberal party in 2005, with Mayencourt winning by 11 votes.

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Federal election fallout

Posted September 3, 2008 by Sacha Peter
Category: News

With a Federal election highly rumoured to be set for October 14, there is likely to be a lot of linkage between the federal parties and the provincial ones. The large overlap will be concerning the carbon tax - will the public be able to distinguish between the federal Liberals and the provincial BC Liberals?

Conservative Saanich-Gulf Islands MP Gary Lunn started by railing against the carbon tax, in both federal and provincial terms.

There will be seven months between the expected federal election and the provincial election, something that is likely the favour the BC Liberals as the Conservatives seemed to have handled Jack Layton’s NDP with kid gloves during the last parliamentary session.

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Public sector executive compensation

Posted August 14, 2008 by Sacha Peter
Category: News

Nothing generates more press than the issue of MLA pay. This issue passed through when the legislature passed Bill 37 after commissioning a study.

Executive compensation in the public service is the second hottest topic, and the government resorted to the best trick in politics - a Friday afternoon press release to announce that deputy minister salaries will be going up approximately 35%.

This will not be an election issue in May 2009, but this will likely be a political issue when the majority of public sector union contracts come up for renegotiation in 2010.

Executive compensation is a very tricky issue - too low and you will lose people to the private sector and worse yet, encourage mediocre (and worse) executives to the public service (which is more damaging than not having any executives around at all). Too high, and you start to run some political risk concerning the rest of your public service (concerns also seen with public corporations in terms of CEO compensation that has a public perception of being too high).

In the press release, the government states the following:

A comparison of current compensation levels of public service jurisdictions across Canada shows that B.C. ranks 10th for assistant deputy minister compensation and sixth for deputy minister compensation. The new framework will place the BC Public Service third among the provinces and the federal government. Deputy minister compensation will be set at 83 per cent of federal salaries, as it was prior to 2006, and will be subject to the same regular review cycle to ensure ongoing competitiveness.

Giving compensation increases (or decreases) with the benchmarking argument (i.e. if others do it, so should we) is a poor basis for compensation increases. Typically in organizations, the best return is where performance metrics are clear and compensation is linked to achieving those metrics, regardless of what other people in other jurisdictions get paid.

I can just imagine if every province in the country decided they wanted to be the third highest ranked province in terms of public executive pay.

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Pre-Election cabinet shuffle

Posted June 23, 2008 by Sacha Peter
Category: News

The BC Government announced their new cabinet today, which is summed up in this press release.

Most notable is that Colin Hansen is once again the Minister of Finance - he served for a year after Gary Collins resigned in 2004. Colin Hansen has always been a steady and competent performer in cabinet and a relatively safe choice for Gordon Campbell.

Other significant shifts include Stan Hagen moving from Tourism to Agriculture and Lands, which might be politically motivated - Hagen’s riding of Comox Valley (nearly untouched after the 2009 boundary changes) is vulnerable.

Finally, East Kootenay MLA Bill Bennett, who has sat as a backbencher after his delightfully blunt email to a constituent, has been promoted again to the Tourism ministry. East Kootenay is going to become Kootenay East after the 2009 redistribution and the change to the electoral boundary is minor - click the graphic below for an enhanced view - the red outline and the coloured areas are the 2005 boundaries, while the 2009 boundaries are defined in thick black lines. The two areas in question are sparsely populated, but both have slightly trended BC Liberal.

Bill Bennett is going to face a challenge in the 2009 election.

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