Polling, naming or leading? The factors behind BC United’s implosion

What went wrong for BC United? How did the party that governed B.C. for 16 years go from official Opposition to waving the white flag less than two months before election

When BC United leader, Kevin Falcon, pulled the plug on his party’s electoral hopes and his own political future Wednesday, he was following in the footsteps of other centre-right political leaders in British Columbia.

And while the re-branding debacle and Falcon’s own political baggage factored into the dramatic about-face, veteran political observers, analysts, and pollsters believe there are many factors behind BC United’s demise.

On Tuesday morning, Falcon was campaigning in his typical style, forcefully advocating for strong policy and insisting that “when the public's given the choice, and they look at their options, I feel very good about our prospects.”

When he stood in front of journalists a little more than 24 hours later alongside the BC Conservative leader to announce he was withdrawing from the race, CTV News asked what happened overnight to lead to the sudden capitulation.

“The thing about negotiations like this is you have to continue moving forward as a party while you're having a two-track discussion, that's the way it is,” Falcon replied, later going on to reveal hours-long conversations with Rustad began at 9 p.m. Tuesday.

It’s still not clear what precipitated the sudden change, which left many BC United staffers and even MLAs in the dark.

Federal politics and bad timing

When Falcon was elected leader by the party, there were some concerns his hiatus from politics wasn’t enough to make him a “fresh face” to take over since he’d been a prominent cabinet minister under BC Liberal premier, Gordon Campbell.

There’s little doubt the re-branding to BC United was disastrous, with voters unfamiliar with the new name and little effort on the party’s part to change that. But there’s no clear nail-in-the-coffin moment to point to in this case.

“I think it more had to do with things that were outside the party's control and outside Kevin Falcon's control and the big change, of course, has happened at the federal level,” pointed out University of the Fraser Valley political scientist, Hamish Telford.

“Pierre Poilievre has been able to really take advantage of the fatigue voters felt with Justin Trudeau,” he said. “There’s a Conservative wave from coast to coast, and when these waves happen – if you are in its way – you get swamped. And that's what happened to Kevin Falcon.”

The unspoken factor

Falcon faced a barrage of question from reporters at the joint press conference with John Rustad, where he insisted the decision was based on discussions with British Columbians and a strong desire to defeat the New Democrats.

He did not mention the words “polls” or “polling,” even though under his leadership BC United went from support in the 40 per cent range down to single digits in recent weeks. The defection of multiple candidates in the wake of the flagging support seemed to weaken the party’s showing in the polls even further.

ResearchCo president and veteran political analyst, Mario Canseco, observed that Falcon often pooh-poohed opinion polls and repeatedly claimed that no one was paying attention to politics in the summer months. Despite that, Falcon made a major policy announcement in August to draw some interest and, likely, donor support.

It does not appear that strategy was successful, and Falcon acknowledged fundraising struggles, leading to his endorsement of Rustad.

“It’s not as if this is going to be an easy marriage,” said Canseco of the United and Conservative candidates, party members, and supporters. “This is going to come down to a riding-by-riding situation that's not going to be easy for either of them.”