In case you missed it, the election campaign is now officially underway.
NDP leader Carole James was in town Saturday to officially kick off the campaign. It’s one of the drawbacks to fixed election dates, the ‘unofficial’ campaign kicks off long before the actual campaign.
In addition to slamming the Liberal government for building “a fancy new roof” in B.C. Place instead of creating housing for seniors and homeless, James introduced the candidates who will take a run at unseating Education Minister Shirley Bond and Forest Minister Pat Bell.
It is kind of ironic, and they maintained purely coincidental, that Julie Carew, who works in the education industry, will going up against Bond, the education minister. And, Tobias Lawrence, a registered professional forester, will be trying to unseat Bell, the forest minister.
It should make for an interesting level of debate as we march inexorably toward March 12.
Even though both candidates were acclaimed, the NDP have picked a couple of good ones. Both Lawrence and Carew are articulate and have done their homework. Too often parties put candidates in place just so they can have a candidate running (i.e. the Green Party debacle in the last federal election).
Not this time. Both Lawrence and Carew are legitimate, serious candidates. But, the task ahead of them won’t be easy.
There is no doubt Bond and Bell will be tough to unseat. Both were first elected in 2001, when the Liberals swept into office. Both have also worked hard and remained popular. In 2001, when the electorate was sending a message to the NDP, Bond was elected with 55 per cent of the vote and Bell with 61 per cent. They were both re-elected in 2005, although the margin of victory was less. Bell captured 7,659 votes for 49.93 per cent of the popular vote. Bond was elected on the strength of 4,585 votes, which was 41.01 per cent of the vote. The wild card for Bond in 2005, though, was former Liberal MLA Paul Nettleton who ran as independent and walked away with 15 per cent of the vote. He, undoubtedly, drew support away from Bond. Nettleton won’t be back in 2009.
That leaves, so far, a campaign between Bond and Carew in the new riding of Prince George-Valemount, and Bell and Lawrence in the new riding of Prince George-Mackenzie.
It should be a very interesting campaign. Bell will, and still does, have some tough questions to answer regarding the Worthington pulp mill in Mackenzie, such as apparently Worthington was not required to post an environmental bond. Plus, he’s probably not too popular in that northern town right now given the tough times up there.
Over in the Bond camp, she, in a roundabout way, has to also fight the BCTF, which is campaigning hard over class sizes, the Foundation Skills Assessment tests, and a host of other things. The BCTF have been running lots of ads (prior to the election advertising rules kicking in) hammering the ministry of education.
That’s one of the downsides about being a cabinet minister, you have to defend what you’ve done as an MLA and as a cabinet minister.
Like I said, it should make for some good debates.
This isn’t going to be a cakewalk for any candidate. Let the campaigning begin.