2021 Election Results: NDP Holding Firm in British Columbia, Still Hoping to Win Seats

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All 11 NDP incumbents in British Columbia retained their seats on Monday, and had won at least one by the publication deadline.

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The race at Port Moody-Coquitlam continued to be fast-paced until NDP contender Bonita Zarillo was declared the winner over current conservative Nelly Shin. In 2019, Shin won the race with just over 150 votes more than Zarillo.

The NDP could still win another seat at Nanaimo-Ladysmith as it was too close to call as the deadline approached.

Green incumbent Paul Manly will lose his seat to NDP rival Lisa Marie Barron or conservative candidate Tamara Kronis. The two challengers traded leads overnight Monday, but the final result may not be decided for several days, because more than 7,000 votes by mail have yet to be counted.

In Vancouver-Granville, the seat was up for grabs as NDP candidate Anjali Appadurai kept on the heels of liberal challenger Taleeb Noormohamed throughout the night. Noormohamed leads by 230 votes, but there are 5,776 mail-in ballots that could change the outcome.

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Noormohamed was considered the favorite, but may have lost some support when it was revealed that he changed 42 properties in the last five years. The NDP campaign may have been bolstered by Jody Wilson-Raybould, who did not show up this time. During the campaign, Wilson-Raybould published excerpts from his book, Indian in the Cabinet, which pointed to Justin Trudeau. She also tweeted how disappointed she was that she couldn’t meet Singh in person when he was racing his horse.

The NDP made no secret of the fact that it was pinning its hopes on the charisma and personal popularity of its leader, Jagmeet Singh, to help him hold onto his 11 seats in British Columbia and win more constituencies that were narrow, three-way. Races

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Victoria University political science professor Michael Prince said: “In fact, Singh continued to be rated the most popular and likeable of all leaders throughout the campaign. I just couldn’t translate that into seating. “

The NDP focused much of its campaign on British Columbia, with its leader making half a dozen appearances in the districts of Metro Vancouver, where he held four seats, and on Vancouver Island, where he won five of seven seats in 2019.

On Monday night, NDP candidates, including Singh, retained their four seats in Burnaby South, New Westminster-Burnaby, Vancouver Kingsway, Vancouver East, as well as the five seats they previously held on Vancouver Island including Victoria, Esquimalt-Saanich-Sooke, Courtenay- Alberni, Cowichan-Malahat, and North Island-Powell River.

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The federal NDP may have benefited from the support of the provincial party. Hundreds of provincial NDP volunteers volunteered their time to federal candidates. Prime Minister John Horgan kept a low profile for much of the campaign, but tweeted his support for the party on Saturday, as did Provincial Cabinet Ministers Adrian Dix and Sheila Malcolmson, who left their jobs as NDP MP for Nanaimo, to go provincially.

“One of the things that has changed in BC is that Prime Minister John Horgan got seats where the NDP never had and I think that’s the kind of rising tide that can lift all ships,” said the political science professor at the NDP. UBC, Gerald Baier.

That pothole may have been smoothed out a bit by Justin Trudeau’s message in the final days of the campaign.

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“I’ve never heard Justin Trudeau use the term ‘progressives’ as much as he did in the last week of the election,” Prince said.

“Appealing to progressive voters to prevent conservatives from winning may have lost some votes in the NDP,” he said.

Singh did not target the north or the interior of BC, where the NDP had only two seats prior to this election. He participated in Zoom-style meetups and greetings, but did not appear in person to their headlines. Despite Singh’s lack of personal attention to the districts, NDP incumbents Taylor Bacharach won at Skeena-Bulkley Valley and Richard Cannings took his seat at Okanagan-West Kootenay.

Even though the NDP didn’t win much more in BC during this election, Prince said Singh got what he wanted.

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“Although the NDP didn’t make much more in British Columbia, it is still the power broker in Ottawa,” Prince said. “Singh is likely to be able to pressure the Trudeau minority government to go ahead with Pharmacare and maybe even tax the wealthy.”

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