2013 British Columbia general election


The 2013 British Columbia general election took place on May 14, 2013, to elect the 85 members of the 40th Parliament of British Columbia to the Legislative Assembly in the Canadian province of British Columbia. The British Columbia Liberal Party formed the government during the 39th Parliament prior to this general election, initially under the leadership of Premier Gordon Campbell then after his resignation, Christy Clark. The British Columbia New Democratic Party under the leadership of Carole James, and then Adrian Dix, formed the Official Opposition. The BC Green Party under the leadership of Jane Sterk and the BC Conservative Party under John Cummins were also included in polling, although neither party had representation at the end of the 39th Parliament.
The Liberal Party won its fourth straight majority; Clark was defeated in her riding, but she was re-elected to the legislature in a subsequent by-election in Westside-Kelowna on July 10, 2013, after Liberal MLA Ben Stewart stepped down on her behalf. The NDP remained the official opposition, losing two seats, and the Green Party won its first seat.
Despite their victory, the Liberals had been consistently several points behind the opposition New Democrats in every public opinion poll throughout the campaign. Even poll results released on the very last day of the campaign suggested that the New Democrats had an eight to nine percentage point margin over the Liberals. Only one pollster, Forum Research, had released a poll which suggested that the Liberals were close enough that a victory was even possible for them, although even that poll had the New Democrats ahead by two percentage points. The Liberals' upset victory led to significant media debate about the quality of opinion polling in Canadian elections.

Timing

Section 23 of British Columbia's Constitution Act provides that general elections occur on the second Tuesday in May of the fourth calendar year after the last election. As an election was held on May 12, 2009, the next election was scheduled for May 14, 2013. The same section, though, makes the fixed election date subject to the Lieutenant Governor's right to dissolve the Legislative Assembly as he or she sees fit.
The writs were dropped April 16, 2013, and the general election was held on May 14, 2013, with advance voting made available on May 8 through 11.

Background

After leading the BC Liberals for 17 years, Gordon Campbell announced he would resign as Premier and party leader in November 2010. This was seen as the result of opposition to the Harmonized Sales Tax, which was very unpopular with voters.
In the ensuing leadership campaign, Christy Clark, the eventual winner, suggested she would prefer to hold an election earlier than 2013 to secure her own mandate. She was believed to be preparing her party for an election as early as autumn 2011. However, due to the unfavourable result from the HST referendum, she decided to rule out an early election.

Political parties

This is a list of political parties who ran candidates in the 2013 election:

Results

Summary of the May 14, 2013,
Legislative Assembly of British Columbia election
!rowspan="2" colspan="2" align="center"|Party
!rowspan="2" align="center"|Party leader
!rowspan="2" align="center"|Candidates
!colspan="5" align="center"|Seats
!colspan="3" align="center"|Popular Vote
!colspan= 3 align=center| Total
!376 !!85 !!85 !!85 !!— !!100.0 !!1,803,051 !!100.00

Voter turnout

Voter turnout was 57.1%, but varied from riding to riding. 10 of the 85 ridings had less than 50% voter turnout. Richmond and Kelowna were the only major cities with under 50% turnout.

Retiring incumbents

;Liberals
;New Democrats
;Independents
Polling FirmDate of PollingLinkLib.NDPGreenCons.Othertype of pollsample size
Election 201344.1439.718.134.763.25ballot1,803,051
Ipsos Reid3745963online800
Angus Reid Public Opinion3645973online803
EKOS34.540.513.09.32.7IVR861
Angus Reid Public Opinion3645964online808
Justason Market Intelligence31451483online700
Ipsos Reid37431073online800
Forum Research4143862IVR1,147
Hill & Knowlton34.641.113.67.53.3online804
Oraclepoll Research37411210telephone1,000
Campaign Research353813105IVR1,303
Angus Reid Public Opinion344112103online808
Ipsos Reid35451073online1,000
Insights West334114111online855
Forum Research35391293IVR1,055
Abacus Data33431293online1,042
Angus Reid Public Opinion314510113online812
Justason Market Intelligence274912112telephone/online600
Ipsos Reid29489113online800
Angus Reid Public Opinion284513123online804
EKOS28.444.911.113.02.7IVR917
Election 2009–45.8242.158.212.101.72ballot1,640,542

Candidates

The following is a list of candidates, as shown on the list of candidates that have officially registered as noted by Elections BC's for more details.

Kootenays

Okanagan, Shuswap and Boundary

Thompson and Cariboo

Fraser Valley

Surrey

Richmond and Delta

Vancouver's eastern suburbs

Vancouver

North Shore and Sunshine Coast

Vancouver Island

Greater Victoria