Wilkinson Quits, Clearing Way for Falcon to Run for MLA

New BC Liberal Leader Kevin Falcon says he will seek a seat in the British Columbia legislature at the earliest opportunity.

That opportunity should come fairly quickly with the announcement today that former leader Andrew Wilkinson, who in 2020 led the party to its worst defeat in decades, is stepping down as the MLA for Vancouver-Quilchena.

Premier John Horgan has six months from Wilkinson’s official resignation date to call a byelection, and Falcon said today he plans to run. “I’m excited about that opportunity.”

Falcon defeated Skeena MLA Ellis Ross who came second, MLAs Michael Lee and Renee Merrifield; and Val Litwin, Gavin Dew and Stan Sipos.

In changes announced today, Falcon appointed Ross as the critic for energy and LNG, Lee as critic for Indigenous relations and Merrifield as critic for environment and climate change. He made Kamloops-South Thompson MLA Todd Stone the new House leader and moved Kamloops-North Thompson MLA Peter Milobar to the finance critic role.

Falcon is a former BC Liberal cabinet minister who spent the last nine years working for a real estate investment and development company.

“I’m humbled by the strength of support that I’ve received tonight and I’m encouraged by the mandate you have provided,” Falcon said in a speech Saturday evening after the result of the leadership vote was announced at the Sheraton Wall Centre in Vancouver.

“It’s a mandate to return to a party of principles, a party of big ideas and a party that has never been more ready for real renewal,” he said.

Falcon won 47-per-cent support on the first ballot, but it took four more rounds of counting members’ second, third and fourth choices before he had the more than 50-per-cent support needed. For leadership contests the BC Liberal party uses ranked ballots and gives each of the province’s 87 constituencies an equal weight of 100 points.

After he was first elected as an MLA in 2001 to represent Surrey-Cloverdale, Falcon served as the minister of state for deregulation under former premier Gordon Campbell, a role in which he says he contributed to cutting one-third of unnecessary government red tape and regulation. He later became minister of transportation, then health.

In the 2011 BC Liberal leadership race Falcon came second to Christy Clark, who as premier appointed him minister of finance and deputy premier.

Falcon chose not to run for re-election in 2013 and took a job as an executive vice-president with Anthem Capital Corp., a company whose main business is real estate investment and development.

During the leadership campaign Falcon said the BC Liberals lost power because they had failed to lead on issues that mattered to British Columbians.

And while Falcon said he still believes in low taxes, some of the things the NDP government has done deserve support, including the guarantee of five paid sick days a year and the push to provide $10-a-day child care.

“I will support the NDP when they make decisions that are good for British Columbia,” Falcon told BC Liberals following his win. “I’ve done so in the past. But as I’ve watched them govern over the past five years, I’ve concluded that their fundamental weakness is... that they don’t fundamentally know how to get big things done in the province of British Columbia, and that’s where we come in.”

He also stressed that under his leadership he wants everyone to feel welcome in the party.

“Let me just be really clear about one thing,” he said. “I want to see British Columbians of all races, sexualities, genders, cultures, religions and all economic backgrounds know that they can join us as proud BC Liberals, excited about our future and happy to share the values that we share.”

Falcon told The Tyee today that he spoke about the need to diversify the party from the time he launched his leadership campaign. “I would rather not win unless the party’s prepared to be rock solid behind me in the change in direction I want to take this party,” he said after meeting with the Liberal caucus.

“People are free to have their opinions, and sometimes they can have unpopular opinions,” he added. “[But] I will never tolerate intolerance. That’s very important to me and I want everyone to know that.” Social conservatives and people from all religious backgrounds are welcome as long as they are willing to be tolerant, he said.

Within minutes of the leadership result being announced, the BC NDP released a statement saying Falcon’s record in government included hiking car insurance rates while raiding funds from ICBC, increasing Medical Service Plan premiums, adding bridge tolls, ignoring the effect of real estate speculation on housing prices, and cutting services.

“Instead of renewing their party, the BC Liberals have turned back to old, out-of-touch ideas that don’t work for people,” it quoted Vancouver-Hastings MLA Niki Sharma. “Kevin Falcon’s tax giveaways for the top one per cent would mean service cuts and higher costs for everyone else. His record shows that he’s in it for the wealthy and well-connected and would make life harder for the rest of us.”

The BC Green Party put out a statement from leader and Cowichan Valley MLA Sonia Furstenau congratulating Falcon on the win.

“I am looking forward to continuing work with the Official Opposition to hold the government to account when the legislature resumes on Tuesday,” she said. “I know there are many areas of common ground from which we can work together.”

Asked how voters might reconcile his promise of compassion in government with his record on social issues while in cabinet, Falcon said that in 2001 the BC Liberals inherited a situation from the NDP where tough choices were needed.

“They had doubled the debt, they ran deficits in eight out of the 10 years and we had some of the highest taxes in North America,” he said. “We had to make some really difficult changes to get us back on a sustainable path as a government, and frankly, it’s not a lot of fun.”

Falcon said a strong economy provides the revenues to do great things like the BC Liberals did in their later years in power, adding he’s running to get the NDP out of office before the party does too much damage.

Speaking ahead of the announcement of the results Saturday, Prince George-Valemount MLA Shirley Bond, who served as interim leader following Wilkinson’s resignation as leader, said the 28 MLAs in the BC Liberal caucus know that they can have disagreements while still working well together.

“Our team is excited to welcome a new leader,” she said, acknowledging that the leadership campaign had been messy and stressing the need to work together ahead of the election scheduled for 2024. “We’re giving notice to the NDP government that we’re coming for them.”

Bond will continue as the leader of the Official Opposition in the legislature until Falcon wins a seat.

Falcon said that with the support and enthusiasm of Liberal members he’ll work to connect with voters and earn their trust.

“I’ve always said we got most things right in government, not everything, but we got the big important things right,” Falcon said. “We were leaders once, and let me tell you tonight, we will be leaders again in the province of British Columbia.”