After Findlay, What Comes Next?

Kerry-Lynne Findlay’s disastrous stint as Conservative Party of BC leader didn’t just destroy the party. In less than four months, she managed to blow up hope of recreating the centre-right coalition that governed the province for 47 of the last 66 years.

Findlay also set up an ethical test for NDP Premier David Eby, who had been considering calling a snap election while she was still leader.

Findlay’s totalitarian style, botched hiring and MLA expulsions all cemented the idea that “true Conservatives” in the party had to be alert to infiltration by non-believers like former BC Liberals.

Even Findlay’s resignation letter — a whopper at more than 800 words — bemoaned the fact that her departure betrayed the will of the members who chose her in May.

“When those members participate in a democratic process and make a decision, that decision deserves to be respected — whether we personally agree with it or not,” she wrote. “No political party can ask its members for their time, their money, and their trust and then decide their voices only matter when they produce the outcome some people want.”

That references an assertion, wildly popular on X, that Findlay was the victim of a coup by a combination of BC Liberal/United MLAs and others who objected to her brand of conservatism.

But the departing MLAs offered plausible critiques of Findlay’s bumbling, autocratic leadership — not least her terrible staff choices and the scandals that resulted from them. The most recent was the revelation that the party’s former executive director, Elaine Allan, a Findlay choice, had hired a private detective to investigate at least 14 people, including Conservative MLAs, former Conservative Party of BC staff, CHEK News reporter Rob Shaw and Lululemon billionaire Chip Wilson.

It appears Findlay assumed that winning the leadership on the fourth ballot, by the narrowest of margins, meant she had absolute power, instead of recognizing that her first priority should be bringing members together.

The next steps for BC’s right wing

There’s much talk now of uniting the right. For starters, finding a way to combine CentreBC, now headed by Findlay defector Peter Milobar and with eight MLAs, and the remnants of the Conservatives, now with 24 MLAs, down 20 since the 2024 election.

One reason is money. The Conservatives have mailing lists and a guaranteed $1.8 million a year in public funding based on the last election. CentreBC is ill-equipped to fund an election campaign.

But Findlay has left behind a bunch of Conservative party members convinced that only they possess the true values that will save B.C. The idea of working with non-believers fills them with horror. Building a broad coalition will be almost impossible.

Which is great news for the NDP.

The Eby government had been considering a snap election call to take advantage of Findlay’s weak position as Conservative leader, justifying it with the need for a strong mandate to deal with Trump tariffs and the economy.

But the underlying reasons are obvious. The NDP government has struggled, with record deficits and a failure to address most of the issues affecting the public, from health care to social policy to policing to forestry.

In comparison to the Conservative clown show, however, the NDP looks pretty good.

The election would come despite the fact B.C. was the first province to introduce a law, in 2001, to try to limit this kind of political game-playing by requiring elections every four years.

The snap election pretext might have held up — barely — if Findlay had kept her job.

But now the Conservatives, the official Opposition charged with holding the government to account, are leaderless and lost. Cariboo-Chilcotin MLA Lorne Doerkson is interim leader. But the party has no plan to select a permanent leader in the immediate future, and the centre-right political scene is in chaos.

A snap election would probably work, giving the NDP a strong mandate.

It would also be an opportunistic attack on democracy, seeking to deny voters a clear choice between parties with defined policies and candidates — the essence of our system.

Eby’s decision on an election could come as early as today. He should say no.