A familiar name in B.C. politics returning to Victoria with a new party says the state of health care, especially in rural communities, played an important role in the election outcome.
Peter Milobar, MLA-elect for Kamloops-Centre for the Conservative Party of B.C. cited health care, along with affordability and public safety, as the issues that ultimately led to Saturday's close election outcome.
"We have been saying that for months now," Milobar said. "It's been ignored and dismissed by the (B.C. NDP) over and over again."
Milobar added that Eby either found himself in an echo chamber of people who told him what they thought he wanted to hear or he just chose to ignore what "large swaths of the population were saying over and over again."
Milobar was in part responding to comments from Eby Tuesday, when he spoke for the first time after Saturday's election. Eby said British Columbians sent him and his party a "strong message" that improvements are needed in several areas including health care.
"They want their emergency rooms open and running," Eby said. "They want their family doctor and anything less is unacceptable."
"Well, what a shocking revelation," Milobar said. "He had to go through an election to figure that out? He wasn't taking those concerns seriously. For the last two years, we have seen ever-increasing ER closures across B.C."
Speaking on Mo Amir's VANCOLOUR podcast, Conservative Party of B.C. executive director Angelo Isidorou spoke to importance of rural voters.
"This (party) is a coalition of, if anything, rural voters for sure, Indo-Canadians in Surrey, Chinese-Canadians in Richmond, 18-to-34-year- and 35-to-55-year-old people that are working."
Milobar expressed hope for "good-faith conversations" with the B.C. Greens who hold the balance of power but also defended promises by party leader John Rustad to take down the B.C. NDP at the earliest possible opportunity.
"Fundamentally, an opposition's job is to try to bring down the government and change government," Milobar said.
Ultimately, much of the current discussion amounts to speculation, Milobar said, pointing to the two ridings subject to automatic recounts.
The initial count shows the B.C. NDP leading in 46 seats, the Conservative Party of B.C. leading in 45 and the B.C. Greens leading into two. Officials must also count an estimated 49,000 absentee and mail-in ballots.
Two, possibly three ridings, could flip, Milobar said. He especially singled out the Vancouver Island riding of Juan de Fuca-Malahat, where the lead of the B.C. NDP candidate is 20 votes.
Milobar also pointed to the events of 2020 when West Vancouver-Sea to Sky flipped from the B.C. Greens to then B.C. Liberals as mail-in ballots started to be counted. A judicial recount later confirmed that incumbent Jordan Sturdy had beaten the B.C. Greens' Jeremy Valeriote, one of two Greens set to go to Victoria this year.
Milobar said the results have probably left many NDP supporters angry and frustrated. Five full cabinet ministers and 11 incumbents lost their seats.
"I would suggest it was a failure by any measure for the NDP in this last election and I think internally, Eby has a lot of explaining to do."
Others have argued otherwise. Speaking Saturday as results were coming in, B.C.'s Health Minister Adrian Dix said his party's vote share of almost 45 per cent was the party's third-best performance in its history.
"It is always close in B.C.," Dix said. "It's a two-way race in B.C. and in the world right now, incumbent governments have been having challenges getting re-elected," Dix said. "There is a strong anti-incumbent view in the world and in the face of that, the premier's performance has just been outstanding."
A similar argument comes from Kareem Allam, a partner at Fairview Strategy. He said Eby hugely helped his party's campaign. Allam said this was a "change" election, but in the end, British Columbians were not willing to hand over the keys to the Conservatives because they did not look like a government in waiting.
Milobar remains optimistic reflecting on the decision by his old party — B.C. United — fold its campaign six weeks before the start of the campaign to avoid a split on the right.
"The fact that we're in a position of waiting on recounts and mail-in-ballots and...speaks volumes," he said. "It certainly put us much closer to the objective, which was replacing the NDP."
That would be unprecedented in many ways, because the party had had just two MLAs — Party Leader John Rustad and Bruce Banman, neither of them elected as Conservatives — when the legislature rose in May 2024.
If Conservatives fall short of forming government, Isidorou also offered this message on Amir's podcast: "If we have the misfortune of another NDP government, you thought two of us were bad, get ready because 45 of us are going to be a massive pain in the ass."
