Tuesday October 8, 2024 | VICTORIA, BC
Political analysis by Mary P Brooke | Island Social Trends [Updated Oct 9, 2024]
BC ELECTION CAMPAIGN DAY 18 of 28
Your 28-day voter’s guide for BC Election 2024
Tonight’s debate didn’t provide intensive or organized platform information for voters.
People at hope won’t have learned a whole lot, other than to observe the leadership capacity and personality of the candidates.
David Eby (BC NDP) carries the stature of a premier, John Rustad (BC Conservatives) seems dated in his demeanor, and Sonia Furstenau (BC Greens) was feisty.
The 90 minutes seemed long. While the moderator’s questions were well composed, the format served to fracture any solid results for viewers.
For anyone who didn’t already have a political alignment, there wasn’t a lot there to more deeply inform.
With this event behind us, the leaders and their parties are likely to now double-down for the last 12 days of the campaign on things that ‘get out the vote’ (i.e. door knocking, promotion of advance voting).
But overall, the debate provided a three-way presence for party leaders. While one of BC NDP or BC Conservatives will form govt after October 19 (majority or minority), the BC Greens are proving themselves to be a contributing force for policy shifts.
Afterward, BC Green Leader Furstenau said she was disappointed that neither addressed the growing corporatization of housing rental markets. “To effectively tackle both the housing and affordability crises in BC we need strong legislation to curb the influence of REITs (Real Estate Investment Trusts) in our housing market. I look forward to seeing more concrete proposals from both of my opponents on this critical issue in the future.”
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A livestreamed and televised BC leaders debate — the only one in this 43rd BC election — is on tonight at 6:30 pm, live from Vancouver. [Analysis to follow on this page, revisit later]
- The debate is a CBC consortium debate. It will be livestreamed on CBC at https://www.cbc.ca/player/play/video/9.6528808
- The debate will be broadcast live on Global BC, Global Okanagan and BC1, from 6:30 pm to 8 p.m.
Party leaders:
The BC NDP Leader is David Eby, the BC Conservative Leader is John Rustad, and the BC Green Leader is Sonia Furstenau.
They also participated in a previous debate that was held on CKNW radio on October 2.
Moderator:
Tonight’s debate will be moderated by Shachi Kurl who is president of the Angus Reid Institute (which mostly takes a center-right view on provincial political issues).
Debate process:
Every debate seems to have its own format and tone. But overall these events are for voters. People can learn a lot about a leader by how they answer questions, their body language, and their overall approach to the debate.
Loyal supporters will be reconvinced and undecided voters will possibly have more information by which to make their voting decision on October 19 (or in advance voting October 10, 11, 12, 13, 15 and 16).
Post-debate analysis:
After tonight’s debate, there will be analysis posted here on Island Social Trends (revisit this page), and on BC1 TV with Chris Gailus, Sophie Lui, Keith Baldrey and Richard Zussman.
Island Social Trends subscribers will receive our debate analysis by email. To become a Premium Subscriber click here.
