Activists to NDP, Greens: 'Get Along'

For those who want to see British Columbia elect a "progressive" government on May 17, it's easy to look at the supporters of the New Democratic Party and the Green Party and want to lump them together.

"Yes, our parties are different and they focus on some different things," says Susan Clarke, a peace activist and Green Party member who speaks for the Broad Coalition, a group of women from the two parties who would like to see them co-operate more. But when it comes to talking about what's important to members of the two parties, she says, "our common value is our value of the commons. Both parties cherish the commons and that is really, really important."

By combining the Green and NDP votes, the thinking goes, progressive candidates would have a better chance of winning. It's an idea that comes up regularly in British Columbia politics, especially as the Greens have built support and increased their share of the popular vote.

Targeting winnable races

In practical terms, Clarke says, co-operating means the NDP might not run candidates in constituencies where the Greens have a shot at winning, and the Greens might not run in seats where the NDP and the Liberals are likely to be close. "Splitting the vote is not a good election strategy," says Clarke. In the 2001 election, the Liberals won 77 of the 79 available seats in the legislature. In about nine of those races, she says, co-operation between the Greens and NDP would have made a difference. Progressives still wouldn't have taken the election, but they would have had a much larger voice in the legislature.

This time, she says, the Broad Coalition is organizing to stop a repeat of 2001. They have a meeting set for 7 p.m. March 8 at Victoria's downtown library, and have had previous public meetings in Victoria, Comox, Nanaimo and Nelson, and on Salt Spring Island. They have a website to promote the idea.

"It's a key election for British Columbia," she says, with another Liberal election promising four more years of the neo-conservative privatization agenda. And now is the time when the leaders are listening to what's important to people. "This is a very sensitive window of time. This is perhaps the most sensitive window of time . . . This is the time that we want to ramp up some of that activity that has been happening across the province and give it a little more focus."

Over the past year or so they did some surveying, she says, and found a majority of voters from all the parties supported the idea of the Greens and NDP co-operating. "It made us feel more confident about bringing the idea into the public."

Awkward couple

So what do the parties have to say about it?

"I think people want political parties to co-operate on issues," says Adriane Carr, the leader of the province's Green Party. She looked for that kind of co-operation in her campaign for a proportional representation electoral system, she says, first from Joy MacPhail when she was leader of the NDP and then from Carole James when she won the leadership, but found no support. "You can't cooperate with them. They're not willing to co-operate. It's not possible, much as some people would like them to co-operate."

Besides, she goes on, there really are some major differences between the parties. "The NDP doesn't grasp that there are limits to growth," she says. For example, despite putting a moratorium on new fish farms, she says, while in power the NDP allowed the industry to go ahead and double the size of existing fish farms. "We would phase out fish farms because they are unhealthy, unecological and unsustainable."

Fish farms aren't the only example. The NDP made the first steps on bringing the 2010 Winter Olympics to Vancouver and Whistler, set the RAV project in motion in Vancouver and first proposed adding a natural gas pipeline across Georgia Straight to power three gas-fired electricity generation plants on Vancouver Island. Says Carr: "Both the NDP and the Liberals are mega-project oriented."

Over at NDP headquarters, there is no official position on the question of co-operating with the Greens. A party media relations person said he'd put the question through to Gerry Scott, the NDP's provincial secretary, but it was unlikely anyone would have anything to say on the subject. The party will be running a candidate in every constituency.

The Stephen Harper lesson

Despite the official silence, one election insider says there is worry among NDP strategists about splitting the vote with the Greens. But instead of co-operation, the source says, expect to see the NDP campaign targeting what they see as a soft Green vote.

The strategy would be similar to what played out in the recent federal election, with Liberal leader Paul Martin appealing to NDP voters by saying a vote for the Liberals was the best way to keep Stephen Harper and the Conservatives out of office. When polls are tight, as they were in that election and they have been for the provincial election, it can be a very effective strategy.

Most Green voters agree, the insider says, the most important thing this election is to get rid of Gordon Campbell, or at least send him a strong message. When you ask people what they think is the best way to do that, they conclude on their own the answer is to vote NDP.

If the parties won't co-operate, says the Broad Coalition's Clarke, as the election draws near the coalition will start endorsing candidates in different constituencies. "It's a bit of a voter revolt," she says. "It's like the people in power just play with us, so maybe we'll play with them. It will deal with some of the frustrations of being a voter in B.C."

How much crossover?

But even with co-operation, says political analyst Bernard Schulmann, nobody should assume that every Green voter is going to dutifully mark their ballot for an NDP candidate, or vice versa. "Your average Green voter is not going to vote NDP," he says. A recent poll looking at Greens' second choices, he says, showed around 40 percent would vote NDP, but 30 percent would go to the Liberals and another 30 percent wouldn't vote at all. "The NDP is not the natural home for a lot of Greens."

And even putting that aside, combining Green and NDP votes wouldn't have made much difference in the last election, he says. "Even if every person who voted green ended up voting NDP, the Liberals would still have won a huge honking majority."

At most about 10 seats would have been taken from the Liberals, making the split 67 to 12. "The opposition might have been a little bit better," he says. "It wouldn't have made any difference to how we're governed right now."

Andrew MacLeod is on staff at Monday Magazine and contributes articles to The Tyee.