B.C.’s NDP leadership candidates face a major hurdle: Filling John Horgan’s shoes

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As a general rule, British Columbians don’t hold political leaders on their way out in very high regard.

Long-time Liberal leader Gordon Campbell polled in the single digits before he exited stage right. His successor, Christy Clark, saw her support plunge to the low 30-per-cent range before she gave way to an NDP government.

Now the person who followed her into the premier’s office, John Horgan, is getting ready to depart politics himself. But here’s the difference: he’s leaving on his terms and as one of the most popular premiers in B.C. history, not to mention the country.

His current approval rating is 53 per cent, according to a new poll by Angus Reid. At various times during his five years on the job, that number has been in the high 60s. Meantime, 43 per cent of British Columbians polled say he’ll be remembered as an outstanding or above-average premier. That’s rare.

But this isn’t a column about Mr. Horgan. It’s about who wins the “race” now underway to replace him. I’ve put that word in quotes as this campaign has been dominated by frontrunner David Eby, who is squaring off against a relative unknown challenger by the name of Anjali Appadurai.

On the excitement meter, the leadership campaign of Alberta’s United Conservative Party this is not. However, a new dynamic has recently emerged.

For the longest time, it looked like Mr. Eby’s candidacy was going to be a coronation. It seemed everyone in the NDP caucus believed he was the best person for the job. But then, out of nowhere, Ms. Appadurai, a climate activist, indicated she was going to seek the position. (Her candidacy is still being vetted by the party and has not yet been approved.)

At first, Mr. Eby didn’t appear to take her entry seriously, acting like she was a nuisance candidate hoping to make some noise around climate action. But suddenly, her challenge is being viewed with more concern by the Eby camp.

Here’s why.

Ms. Appadurai is a social activist and climate organizer. She has the backing of Dogwood BC, an environmental organization with a track record for having an impact on elections of all types. It knows how to get a vote out and it has been encouraging members to join the NDP and “put a climate champion” in the premier’s office. There are some, including influential people in the NDP, who believe they could pull this off – unless Mr. Eby starts taking things more seriously and signs up thousands of new members himself.

Among other things, Ms. Appadurai would bring in a windfall-profits tax and take aggressive action around climate change policies, which she has criticized the NDP for not being strong enough on. She talks about wealth redistribution. She is a hardcore union supporter. She is also smart and a charismatic speaker.

Let’s assume for a moment that she doesn’t pull off some miracle upset and Mr. Eby prevails. Well, he immediately confronts a hard problem to fix: He is not John Horgan.

There is a broad swath of the public that cut the NDP some slack because of the everyman persona of the man leading the government. Mr. Horgan is the politician you’d most like to have a beer with. Maybe several.

Mr. Eby isn’t that. People may warm to him, but many simply don’t know him.

But let’s go back to that Angus Reid poll that was so flattering to the outgoing NDP leader. It was less so when evaluating the job his government has done on a range of issues. When it comes to inflation, health care and housing affordability, the government is viewed as performing poorly by at least 73 per cent of those polled.

Of those three issues, it’s unlikely that deep problems with housing affordability and health care (the system is crumbling under fierce demand and staff shortages) are going to get any better soon. Maybe inflation will be brought under control by the time the next election is supposed to be held in two years’ time. Who knows.

That said, Mr. Eby, perhaps in response to complaints that his dull, low-key campaign was being threatened by the upstart Ms. Appadurai, unveiled a housing package that is arguably the most ambitious ever proposed in B.C.

Among other things, it proposes a tax on flipping houses, outlines potential changes to strata rules to allow for more rental opportunities, provides provincial land and financial assistance to build housing for the middle class, and takes a more aggressive approach toward municipalities reluctant to embrace densification.

Whoever becomes the next NDP premier of B.C. will have an enormous challenge. Not least of which will be trying to get the public to forget the enormous shoes they are filling.