Friday October 25, 2024 | VICTORIA, BC [Posted at 5:30 pm | Last update 1:30 pm October 26, 2024]
Political analysis by Mary P Brooke | Island Social Trends
The total number of ballots to be considered at the 2024 BC provincial election final count this weekend (during Oct 26 to 28) is 66,074 says Elections BC in a news release at 5:18 pm today.
About two thirds of the ballots (43,538) are mail-in and assisted-phone votes, while about 1/3 (22,536) are special & absentee ballots. These ballots will be applied across all 93 ridings in the province.
Vote-anywhere:
The wide-option vote-anywhere Elections BC process for this election has in some ways complicated and slowed down the vote-reporting process.
Meanwhile, in this 2024 election more people came out to advance voting over six days than in previous elections.
Automatic recount in two ridings:
Two ridings are undergoing automatic recounts due to having fewer than 100 votes between the top two candidates.
Juan de Fuca-Malahat:
- Juan de Fuca-Malahat (23-vote margin between BC NDP and BC Conservative candidates) –initial count was 23,218 votes (three candidates); now 681 incoming ballots to be counted.
- Update at 1 pm on Oct 26/24: Total votes 23,670. with BC NDP still in the lead with 9,165 which is just 106 votes ahead of the BC Conservative candidate with 9.059; BC Green candidate at 5,446.
- Final count continues through to Monday October 28.
Surrey City Centre:
- Surrey City Centre (93-vote margin between BC NDP and BC Conservative candidates) — initial count was 13,933 votes (five candidates); now 476 incoming ballots to be counted.
- Update at 1 pm on Oct 26/24: Total votes 14,201 votes, with BC NDP at 6,596 ahead of BC Conservatives with 6,434 by a 162-vote margin. Greens at 864 and Other 307.
- Final count continues through to Monday October 28.
Impact of additional weekend vote count:
These additional ballots from other processes other than advance and election day voting will have an impact in all ridings, especially the close-count scenarios.
Usual pattern:
In past elections usually the balance of vote assignment (i.e. for which party) tends to favour the BC NDP candidates (more NDP voters tend to use the additional methods of voting).
If this pattern holds then the Juan de Fuca-Malahat race may well see the final result stay with the BC NDP candidate (Dana Lajeunesse).
Election night notables:
Regardless of which party forms government there will be 58 new MLAs in a legislature of 93.
That will require a lot of time for the newly-elected representatives to get up to speed with the job. There will be pressures on returning MLAs and staff to assure the skill level of new MLAs.
And either way, the two BC Green MLAs will have an inordinate amount of influence as in the government’s expectation of their support for getting any legislation passed.
Voters might rightfully be dismayed at this election result, as it’s almost certainly going to an unstable governing scenario at the BC Legislature for as long as the new government lasts.
===== RELATED:
- Grinding through the process for final BC Election 2024 results (October 27, 2024)
- BC provincial election final count coming up Oct 28 (October 24, 2024)
- Tight race in Juan de Fuca-Malahat exposes long-time political divide (October 20, 2024)
- Official recounts, voter turnout, statement from Premier David Eby (October 20, updated October 21, 2024)
- Don’t be that voter who lets rain spoil the result (October 19, 2024)
- BC Election advance voter turnout 39.3% across eight ridings in Greater Victoria (October 17, 2024)
- Who’s gonna win BC Election 2024? (October 16, 2024)
- Marina Sapozhnikov admires Rustad for his courage (October 13, 2024)
- Dana Lajeunesse hopes to follow in John Horgan’s local footsteps (October 12, 2024)
- David Evans for Juan de Fuca-Malahat: he’s Green, he’s local (October 11, 2024)
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