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Doerkson Pitches Tax Freeze | Political Capital Daily · Political Capital with Rob Shaw

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  Speaker 1: chartered flights. For more, visit helijet.com. It's Monday, September 28th, 2026,
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  Speaker 1: and this is Political Capital Daily. Well, good morning. Happy
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  Speaker 1: Monday to you. We begin a new week, the second
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  Speaker 1: week of BC's general election, which I guess technically starts
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  Speaker 1: on Tuesdays. We're one day early, but it is kind
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  Speaker 1: of basically the reset point for another week in the campaign.
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  Speaker 1: Aileen Machel, former deputy chief of staff to Premier David Eby,
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  Speaker 1: joining me this morning. Hello, Aileen.
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  Speaker 2: Hello. Good morning, Rob.
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  Speaker 1: Happy second campaign week to you.
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  Speaker 3: Yes.
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  Speaker 2: Well, I was thinking.
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  Speaker 4: last night about how, you know, all these good people
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  Speaker 4: working on all the various campaigns and putting in their
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  Speaker 4: time for free probably didn't get any sort of weekend.
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  Speaker 2: So shout out to all those folks.
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  Speaker 1: You're right. They would have been plowing through the entire weekend,
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  Speaker 1: even though we didn't get a lot of announcements on
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  Speaker 1: the weekend, but everyone behind the scenes and various war
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  Speaker 1: rooms and whatnot would have been. And based on all
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  Speaker 1: the social media accounts, pumping out candidates, which we're going
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  Speaker 1: to talk about after the break, some candidates from all
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  Speaker 1: the parties that try to walk you through that, that
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  Speaker 1: there's been a lot of behind the scenes work going on.
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  Speaker 3: So.
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  Speaker 1: Interesting times. For today, if you're looking at your political agenda,
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  Speaker 1: what we know so far, and again, the proviso from
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  Speaker 1: last week is campaigns don't always tell us what they're
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  Speaker 1: doing in detail beforehand, right up because they don't want
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  Speaker 1: to tip each other off so that they start protesting
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  Speaker 1: and trolling and going after each other's campaigns. Uh, I
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  Speaker 1: had mentioned before the 2017 election where the BC liberals
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  Speaker 1: sent a literal troll truck to the NDP's events with
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  Speaker 1: a guy with a microphone shouting at them and this
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  Speaker 1: ancient beat up van. Uh, it's not great. So the
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  Speaker 1: campaigns kind of keep these close to their chest. We
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  Speaker 1: don't know everything for the day. We know the BC
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  Speaker 1: Greens are up at 1030 with, uh, leader Emily Lowen
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  Speaker 1: announcing a child care policy. The Greens have been pretty
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  Speaker 1: upfront in their campaign, uh, events. The BC Conservatives up
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  Speaker 1: at 11 a.m. Leader Lorne Dirksen delivering a policy announcement.
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  Speaker 1: We don't know what it is in Vancouver. The NDP,
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  Speaker 1: I don't know what they got on today, but last
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  Speaker 1: night on Sunday night, the premier was in Prince Rupert
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  Speaker 1: opening a campaign office with a speech there. I would
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  Speaker 1: imagine he's probably there overnight and perhaps he has something
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  Speaker 1: there today. I don't know for sure, but we will
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  Speaker 1: watch that, which leads us into some of the events
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  Speaker 1: from Sunday that we're going to get into to start
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  Speaker 1: off the show here. The first major policy announcement from
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  Speaker 1: the BC Conservatives was Sunday with leader Lauren Dirksen talking
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  Speaker 1: about his commitment to have no new taxes. Here he
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  Speaker 1: is on that.
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  Speaker 3: The solution to so many problems for David Eby has
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  Speaker 3: been to raise taxes. British Columbians have never paid more
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  Speaker 3: tax and got less in return. And they're telling me
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  Speaker 3: everywhere I go, Enough is enough. British Columbians are crying
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  Speaker 3: out for relief. My commitment, our commitment is absolutely ironclad.
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  Speaker 3: We will not raise taxes, not once. And we will
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  Speaker 3: not introduce new taxes, not once. And as your Premier,
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  Speaker 3: I will never allow our government to raise taxes on
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  Speaker 3: hardworking taxpayers in this great province. There's no exceptions to that.
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  Speaker 3: There are no gimmicks to that. There's no accounting tricks.
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  Speaker 3: We don't need fancy solutions in this province. We need
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  Speaker 3: to get back to some basics. And we absolutely have
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  Speaker 3: to focus on things that actually matter to British Columbians.
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  Speaker 3: But I'm ready for that challenge because BC deserves serious
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  Speaker 3: leadership and real change.
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  Speaker 5: The Conservative Party's been clear that health care and education
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  Speaker 5: will bear the brunt of the cuts that they're planning.
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  Speaker 5: And if there's no new revenue sources, And they're going
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  Speaker 5: to be cutting the deficit.
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  Speaker 2: The answer is clear.
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  Speaker 6: It's coming out of health care.
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  Speaker 1: That's the Premier's response waiting to get on a flight
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  Speaker 1: to Prince Rupert from yesterday. So the announcement here from
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  Speaker 1: the leader, no new taxes. I think the question the
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  Speaker 1: Premier raises in response is how do you get out
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  Speaker 1: of the billion, multi-billion, $ 13 billion deficit hole without raising taxes?
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  Speaker 1: Although raising taxes is not the solution that the Premier
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  Speaker 1: proposes either. So they probably... Kind of. Neither wants to
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  Speaker 1: talk about raising taxes, that's for sure, on a campaign.
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  Speaker 1: No one wants to talk about that. Aileen, what did
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  Speaker 1: you think of this as a first announcement from the Conservatives?
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  Speaker 2: Well, yeah, strong slogan.
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  Speaker 4: No new taxes. Lots of little short slogans in his announcement.
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  Speaker 4: It's one of these oversimplification sort of announcements.
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  Speaker 2: That sounds good.
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  Speaker 4: But I think it's actually an opening for the NDP,
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  Speaker 4: an obvious one, because it does tie back to comments
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  Speaker 4: made earlier this year by the BC Conservatives that zeroed
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  Speaker 4: in on health care and education needing to take the
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  Speaker 4: brunt of cuts. Because you've got Dirksen out promising no
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  Speaker 4: new taxes, no raising taxes, all those slogans.
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  Speaker 2: Tax is bad.
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  Speaker 4: But he's also saying he'll aggressively reduce the deficit. So
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  Speaker 4: you can't do both without making significant cuts somewhere. And
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  Speaker 4: I think Dirksen is going to end up spending a
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  Speaker 4: lot of the campaign trying to answer that question of,
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  Speaker 4: you know, if you're going to be reducing revenue and
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  Speaker 4: aggressively cutting the deficit at the same time, where is
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  Speaker 4: it going to come from? Is it going to be
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  Speaker 4: a huge cut to health care, for example, the health
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  Speaker 4: care that people rely on? So I think the NDP
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  Speaker 4: strategy in their war room will be to keep them
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  Speaker 4: very busy on that topic.
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  Speaker 1: The NDP's position is somewhat similar in the sense that
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  Speaker 1: if you don't raise taxes and and you want to
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  Speaker 1: reduce the deficit, you grow the economy. So you could
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  Speaker 1: have the conservatives pivot into that same idea, that sort
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  Speaker 1: of overlap of the two leaders talking about growing the economy,
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  Speaker 1: I guess. I don't know if that's the conservative response,
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  Speaker 1: but you're right. You'll get questions about that, as the
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  Speaker 1: premier will too, because the last election campaign, the premier
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  Speaker 1: promised to show a path to balance, which we haven't
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  Speaker 1: got either. So I think at some point, the economics
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  Speaker 1: and the platforms and the costing and all of that,
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  Speaker 1: usually towards the end of the campaign, these days, you
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  Speaker 1: get that full platform with the costing becomes a kind
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  Speaker 1: of gut check on some of these early snappy lines,
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  Speaker 1: as you were mentioning.
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  Speaker 4: Yeah, and I think economy and jobs will probably be
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  Speaker 4: a big focus for the BC NDP this week.
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  Speaker 2: You know, you mentioned him being in Prince Rupert.
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  Speaker 4: So often when he's up north, he is talking about
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  Speaker 4: the big work that's happening up there under the BC NDP.
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  Speaker 4: A lot of that was in response to Trump's initial
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  Speaker 4: launch of the trade war back, you know, a year
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  Speaker 4: and a half ago when he had the response, strengthen,
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  Speaker 4: diversify plan. And so I think, yeah, there will be
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  Speaker 4: lots of questions to him as well on the economic
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  Speaker 4: work that he plans to bring forward, as well as
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  Speaker 4: updates on, you know, how that work is already going,
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  Speaker 4: what kind of projects are underway and what does that
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  Speaker 4: mean for British Columbians?
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  Speaker 1: The press conference with Lauren Dirksen coming with questions from
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  Speaker 1: reporters and one interesting question from a global reporter about
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  Speaker 1: social issues that put some interesting answers we haven't heard
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  Speaker 1: from Dirksen on the record here. Let's just play this exchange.
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  Speaker 3: With respect to abortion, I feel that it's a woman's choice.
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  Speaker 3: And with respect to SOGI, I feel that that needs
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  Speaker 3: to be repealed.
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  Speaker 2: And same-sex marriage?
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  Speaker 6: I'm in favor.
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  Speaker 1: Three issues there. I think we knew SOGI was a
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  Speaker 1: repealment from the conservative. Well, they've talked about it in
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  Speaker 1: the past, but in favor of same-sex marriage and a
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  Speaker 1: woman's right to choose are issues that I'm sure some
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  Speaker 1: people had questions about for this iteration of the conservatives,
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  Speaker 1: because it is a different looking version of the party.
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  Speaker 1: And for the leader to get asked that and say
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  Speaker 1: that seemed somewhat consequential for the conservatives laying down some
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  Speaker 1: markers there. Aileen, what did you think of that?
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  Speaker 4: Well, it's smart for Dirksen to proactively address these things,
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  Speaker 4: noting the history of their party hasn't.
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  Speaker 2: Been good on these issues.
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  Speaker 4: We've seen plenty of Bozer eruptions over the years that
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  Speaker 4: dragged them down, not just during elections, but also in
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  Speaker 4: the House. We know their campaign director, Katie Merrifield, is
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  Speaker 4: a brilliant campaigner and strategist. She knows what she's doing.
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  Speaker 4: And they had a really good start to their campaign
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  Speaker 4: over the last five, six days. And I think that's
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  Speaker 4: in large part because of her skills there. and her
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  Speaker 4: strategic thinking. But no one person is going to be
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  Speaker 4: able to control everything. And the challenge for the conservative
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  Speaker 4: team will be trying to keep a lid on the
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  Speaker 4: crazy that will no doubt eventually seep out. So no
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  Speaker 4: matter what Dirksen says, they can't hide the fact that
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  Speaker 4: there's this powerful voting bloc in their party that has
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  Speaker 4: remained embroiled in these culture war issues and Trump-style politics.
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  Speaker 4: They're the ones that got Carolyn Findlay the leadership. If
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  Speaker 4: you'll remember, she led on the first, second, third, and
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  Speaker 4: fourth ballot. And so it is a very large section
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  Speaker 4: of the membership there.
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  Speaker 2: The other thing I.
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  Speaker 4: Noticed over the last few days is a couple of
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  Speaker 4: other conservative strategist types pointing out, you know, we're conservative,
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  Speaker 4: we're normal. And I think if you have to say that,
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  Speaker 4: it would suggest perhaps not so normal. So I think,
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  Speaker 4: you sort of big tent image that they're trying to portray.
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  Speaker 4: It might actually be a floppy tent that has this
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  Speaker 4: tiny tent strategy underneath that ends up catering to that
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  Speaker 4: block of KLF-supporting Trump-style politics folks.
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  Speaker 2: But we'll see what happens in the weeks ahead.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, I guess the first question, it will be if
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  Speaker 1: a candidate comes out with different views of the ones
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  Speaker 1: the leader just stated, how does he handle that on
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  Speaker 1: the campaign trail? And does he How does he address
• 10:45
  Speaker 1: that discrepancy? And does he say, you know, that people
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  Speaker 1: are entitled to their views, but this is the official
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  Speaker 1: party position, which is how centre-right leaders in the past
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  Speaker 1: have handled it, or how that works in this day
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  Speaker 1: and age? I don't know.
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  Speaker 2: And you're right.
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  Speaker 4: Like, we've seen different approaches taken on different campaigns. There
• 11:01
  Speaker 4: was the Laurie Thronis situation back in 2020. And then,
• 11:08
  Speaker 4: you know, with Brent Chapman being kept in last time,
• 11:10
  Speaker 4: I think that was pretty big news. He ended up
• 11:12
  Speaker 4: having to, you know, hide in a closet. to avoid
• 11:15
  Speaker 4: questions from media, and he was still kept.
• 11:16
  Speaker 2: On as a candidate.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, I wonder if he'll hide in a closet for 1BC,
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  Speaker 1: this campaign where he's running as well. So you never know.
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  Speaker 1: Lots of closets everywhere you go. Okay, we'll take a
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  Speaker 1: quick break here, and then we'll come back with some more. Well,
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  Speaker 1: Political Capital Daily free each and every morning thanks to
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  Speaker 1: by sharing their home enables them to keep up with
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  Speaker 1: rising costs of living across the province. Thanks to Airbnb
• 12:00
  Speaker 1: for its support. And back to the show. Okay, let's
• 12:10
  Speaker 1: get into something that occurred on Friday. We haven't had
• 12:13
  Speaker 1: a daily show since then, but that would be BCNDP
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  Speaker 1: leader David Eby's proposal for an empty condos tax, which
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  Speaker 1: would function as a 2% tax on empty new condos
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  Speaker 1: that are finished, but have not been sold. So they're
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  Speaker 1: not subject to the speculation and vacancy tax because they're
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  Speaker 1: still considered under construction until their first sale. If they
• 12:33
  Speaker 1: are left empty for more than a year, they would
• 12:35
  Speaker 1: be subject to that 2%. And every year after that,
• 12:37
  Speaker 1: another increase of one percent, the, I keep calling him
• 12:40
  Speaker 1: the premier, which I can, he's still the premier, but
• 12:42
  Speaker 1: the leader saying that I would unlock 5,000 condos, potentially,
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  Speaker 1: I guess, by forcing developers to sell them, perhaps even
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  Speaker 1: at a loss. Here is Eby and Dirksen on this issue.
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  Speaker 6: You know, our big challenge is housing and people who
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  Speaker 6: build housing and sell it, not hold it, the home
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  Speaker 6: builders who build housing and sell it to British Clemmons,
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  Speaker 6: they say we're under a lot of pressure. Because the
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  Speaker 6: cost of the things that we use to build housing
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  Speaker 6: are going up. And so we say, well, guess what?
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  Speaker 6: We've got three years of housing supply sitting empty in
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  Speaker 6: the market. Let's open it up for families. Let's tell
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  Speaker 6: those developers who are holding this housing back to artificially
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  Speaker 6: keep prices up that that game is over. And that's
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  Speaker 6: what we're doing here today. I think that resonates with people.
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  Speaker 6: I think that resonates with people who are seeing a
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  Speaker 6: high price of gas and groceries and other impacts. And
• 13:34
  Speaker 6: we've got more to say about those struggles that they're
• 13:36
  Speaker 6: seeing and how we're going to stand by them in
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  Speaker 6: this time, how we're not going to bow down to
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  Speaker 6: Trump and we're not going to bow down to the developers.
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  Speaker 6: We're going to stand up for British Columbians.
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  Speaker 3: And incredibly, we learned last week that they're not done
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  Speaker 3: raising taxes. The solution to condominiums that are in Vancouver
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  Speaker 3: that are out of the marketplace is not to to
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  Speaker 3: add another 2% on top of that cost that is
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  Speaker 3: already making it so difficult for British Columbians to buy
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  Speaker 3: these homes.
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  Speaker 1: Aileen, what did you think of this announcement? And I
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  Speaker 1: guess one of the questions that's come up is how
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  Speaker 1: it fits into, if it does fit into at all,
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  Speaker 1: the big announcement from a few months ago with the
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  Speaker 1: Premier and the Prime Minister in town talking about buying
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  Speaker 1: some of these vacant condos using public money and turning
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  Speaker 1: them into affordable housing, which was a plan that BC
• 14:29
  Speaker 1: government pushed for. It wasn't Ottawa's idea. And it led
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  Speaker 1: to sort of a backlash about the idea of it
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  Speaker 1: was bailing out developers. And then we have this version,
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  Speaker 1: which seems like the polar opposite of that version, which
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  Speaker 1: is we're not going to help, we're going to tax.
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  Speaker 1: And I don't know if they all fit together in
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  Speaker 1: some way or how to sort of reconcile them or
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  Speaker 1: what to make of the announcement. What did you take
• 14:53
  Speaker 1: away from it?
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  Speaker 6: Mm-hmm.
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  Speaker 4: Well, EB is passionate about housing. We've seen that from
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  Speaker 4: him basically since he became a politician. I think it's
• 15:01
  Speaker 4: one of the big reasons why he got into politics
• 15:03
  Speaker 4: in the first place. I remember when we rolled out
• 15:06
  Speaker 4: the 100 Days of Action for him, there were a
• 15:10
  Speaker 4: ton of housing policy measures that were rolled out. And
• 15:13
  Speaker 4: since that time, we've seen rents come down. I think
• 15:15
  Speaker 4: with this tax announcement, it is important. trying to tap
• 15:20
  Speaker 4: into a sentiment that's common among many British Columbians, especially
• 15:23
  Speaker 4: those struggling with costs, because we know it's one of
• 15:26
  Speaker 4: the biggest costs that.
• 15:27
  Speaker 2: Most people face every single month.
• 15:30
  Speaker 4: And I think that on that note, the idea here
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  Speaker 4: is that if developers lowered the price of the condos,
• 15:35
  Speaker 4: they'd likely sell, but they aren't doing that. So the
• 15:39
  Speaker 4: condos sit there at sky-high prices, empty. I think what
• 15:42
  Speaker 4: we've seen from the BCNDP is that they are willing
• 15:44
  Speaker 4: to try lots of different things in order to make
• 15:47
  Speaker 4: housing more affordable, whereas the BC Conservatives have pretty consistently
• 15:52
  Speaker 4: opposed the measures that.
• 15:54
  Speaker 2: Have been brought forward.
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  Speaker 4: I did think it was interesting listening to Dirksen yesterday,
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  Speaker 4: pointing out that the NDP had raised.
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  Speaker 2: Taxes on homes.
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  Speaker 4: I think that that is a bit of a trap,
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  Speaker 4: because that's a fight the NDP is likely more than
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  Speaker 4: willing to have. When you look at housing taxes, the
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  Speaker 4: speculation taxes, is something that is wildly popular in BC
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  Speaker 4: and it's because most people don't pay it. The vast
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  Speaker 4: majority of people don't pay it. It's only people who
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  Speaker 4: have more than one house or home and have at
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  Speaker 4: least one.
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  Speaker 2: That's sitting empty.
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  Speaker 4: And so I think that that is a fight that
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  Speaker 4: the NDP would be willing to have and probably a
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  Speaker 4: risky move for Dirksen to point out those housing taxes.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, he did increase the speculation and vacancy tax in
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  Speaker 1: this announcement too, adding another point to Dirksen's Canadians and
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  Speaker 1: British Columbians who have a second home that they leave
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  Speaker 1: vacant and foreigners as well. The majority of people paying
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  Speaker 1: the speculation vacancy tax now, and I've written numerous columns
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  Speaker 1: on this, are British Columbians and Canadians, which was not
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  Speaker 1: how it started. But that's either a success or a
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  Speaker 1: failure of the tax, depending on how you look at
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  Speaker 1: its evolution over time to push the foreign speculators out.
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  Speaker 1: And the people that are speculators now are us. British
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  Speaker 1: Columbians are speculators. So I don't, that, that is a,
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  Speaker 1: an interesting announcement from the premier. I will have a
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  Speaker 1: column in business in Vancouver this morning. I attended, it
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  Speaker 1: was part of the premier speech where he talked about
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  Speaker 1: going to a room with developers and getting asked to remove, uh,
• 17:24
  Speaker 1: the foreign buyer tax, uh, and, uh, and the kind
• 17:27
  Speaker 1: of specular, I can't remember if it was a speculation
• 17:30
  Speaker 1: vacancy tax too, but saying I was, I told them no.
• 17:33
  Speaker 1: And that is true. I, I, wrote about that. And
• 17:36
  Speaker 1: I was at one of the meetings with the real
• 17:38
  Speaker 1: estate sector, but it was fascinating to me. And the
• 17:41
  Speaker 1: columns kind of sketches a little bit of this out.
• 17:43
  Speaker 1: When the premier meets with developers in meetings, he doesn't
• 17:47
  Speaker 1: sound like that at all. He sounds like I want
• 17:50
  Speaker 1: to work with you. I recognize housing starts are important.
• 17:53
  Speaker 1: We need to keep them up. I understand the market
• 17:56
  Speaker 1: has put you in difficult positions. I want to help.
• 17:59
  Speaker 1: I'm here for ideas. Can we work together? I've in
• 18:02
  Speaker 1: his urban development Institute press conference, he talked about how
• 18:05
  Speaker 1: much flack he had taken for pitching some of their
• 18:07
  Speaker 1: ideas into law, uh, and said it wasn't, they were
• 18:11
  Speaker 1: good ideas and I did them. So I think I
• 18:14
  Speaker 1: find that the, and I guess this is just electioneering,
• 18:16
  Speaker 1: but I just found it so interesting to be in
• 18:18
  Speaker 1: those meetings in the last year and then hear him
• 18:21
  Speaker 1: talk about wanting to help and work together and then
• 18:23
  Speaker 1: come out in an election and say, we'll never bow
• 18:25
  Speaker 1: down to developers. And I thought, Ooh, like, I guess
• 18:29
  Speaker 1: it plays well on the campaign trail, but in reality,
• 18:33
  Speaker 1: He is so smart on housing policy. He knows that
• 18:35
  Speaker 1: you have to keep housing starts going even during a
• 18:39
  Speaker 1: downturn or else you end up eventually in a supply
• 18:42
  Speaker 1: crunch when immigration and other factors jumps back up. So
• 18:45
  Speaker 1: I find that all very interesting tone shift in an
• 18:47
  Speaker 1: election campaign. I wrote a bit about it in a
• 18:50
  Speaker 1: column this morning.
• 18:52
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 18:52
  Speaker 4: And I think, you know, for all parties and all campaigns,
• 18:55
  Speaker 4: communications and messaging does get sharper during elections and I think,
• 19:00
  Speaker 4: you know, it's not necessarily about picking a fight with developers,
• 19:03
  Speaker 4: but about showing that you're standing up for people on
• 19:06
  Speaker 4: the issues that you care about, including housing.
• 19:10
  Speaker 1: The first platform to come out during the election campaign
• 19:12
  Speaker 1: from 1BC, I'm not going to read it all for you,
• 19:14
  Speaker 1: because I think when they're polling at like 2%, which
• 19:16
  Speaker 1: we've talked about in this show before, being in the
• 19:20
  Speaker 1: margin of error in most polls, in fact, there may
• 19:22
  Speaker 1: be negative 2% support for 1BC, which it means if
• 19:25
  Speaker 1: you say that party's name out loud. You may only
• 19:29
  Speaker 1: be allowed to say fewer words for the rest of
• 19:31
  Speaker 1: your life. It's just the balancing of karma and the universe.
• 19:33
  Speaker 1: I'm not entirely sure how that works. But 1BC' s platform
• 19:37
  Speaker 1: includes repealing DRIPA, repealing the Indian Act to transform reserves
• 19:42
  Speaker 1: into townships. That's a federal issue. Good luck with that. Nonetheless,
• 19:47
  Speaker 1: it's in their platform. Restoring all English names on public institutions,
• 19:51
  Speaker 1: a 25% tax cut in every bracket, including corporate, shaving
• 19:55
  Speaker 1: 2% off the 7% PST, balancing the budget within four years,
• 20:01
  Speaker 1: which it doesn't say how, private healthcare, et cetera, some
• 20:06
  Speaker 1: other stuff, eliminating safe supply. cracking down on involuntary drug
• 20:11
  Speaker 1: consumption sites, that kind of thing. So I did notice
• 20:14
  Speaker 1: also adopt a Western Canadian Alliance plan, which was Carrie
• 20:17
  Speaker 1: Lynn Finlay's plan in her election campaign, and her husband
• 20:20
  Speaker 1: is now running for 1BC. So I don't know if
• 20:23
  Speaker 1: that's a mirror of that, but I'm not sure how
• 20:25
  Speaker 1: much time we're going to spend on 1BC, because according
• 20:28
  Speaker 1: to polling, they're inconsequential, to say the least. So spend
• 20:34
  Speaker 1: more time talking about the Greens, I think. I want
• 20:36
  Speaker 1: to just show off, just end the show here with
• 20:40
  Speaker 1: a little bit of discussion on candidates, Aileen. We've had
• 20:45
  Speaker 1: just a flurry, and you know, my email box is
• 20:48
  Speaker 1: full of messages from the campaigns announcing people, and yet
• 20:52
  Speaker 1: I don't think we're even really at maybe even half
• 20:55
  Speaker 1: for both parties of candidates. We covered a previously that
• 21:01
  Speaker 1: there's four big cabinet ministers not running again on the
• 21:03
  Speaker 1: NDP side. Brenda Bailey, Kelly Green, Lena Popham, Ravi Kalan.
• 21:07
  Speaker 1: I saw a couple names here, including Papa Raj, Raj Chauhan,
• 21:11
  Speaker 1: the greatest speaker in the history of British Columbia for
• 21:13
  Speaker 1: his love of cats and Macy the stuffed cat. Papa Raj.
• 21:17
  Speaker 1: I'm not saying who to vote for in Burnaby newest Winster,
• 21:19
  Speaker 1: but I'm just saying Papa Raj is beloved amongst cat lovers.
• 21:23
  Speaker 1: Mike Farnworth running for what I believe is his 87th
• 21:26
  Speaker 1: term in office. I'm not, you'd have to double check
• 21:28
  Speaker 1: the number on that. He helped with Confederation, and here
• 21:31
  Speaker 1: he is now, still in office. Poor Brad West, just
• 21:36
  Speaker 1: waiting for Mike to retire. Not happening anytime soon. He's
• 21:39
  Speaker 1: going to get us into space. He's going to colonize
• 21:42
  Speaker 1: the moon before Farnworth retires. Another hundred years for Farnworth.
• 21:48
  Speaker 1: Some familiar faces from previous one-term tenures of MLAs, Kelly
• 21:54
  Speaker 1: Padden in Chilliwack-Ultus Lake, Raleigh Russell, Boundary Similkameen, Ginny Sims,
• 21:58
  Speaker 1: Suri Panorama. They're all back on the ballot. Aileen, I
• 22:02
  Speaker 1: think there was a couple that caught your eye as well.
• 22:04
  Speaker 3: Yes.
• 22:05
  Speaker 4: Amin Singh, amazing guy, BCNDP party president, former MLA. He's
• 22:10
  Speaker 4: going to be running in the seat that was held
• 22:13
  Speaker 4: by George Chao. And then the other one that's really interesting,
• 22:16
  Speaker 4: because this.
• 22:17
  Speaker 3: Is- Did George Chao retire?
• 22:18
  Speaker 1: Or did he move seats? This is a question that
• 22:22
  Speaker 1: I've just occurred to me right now. I should have
• 22:24
  Speaker 1: Googled it. I can't, I don't remember if George Chow's
• 22:26
  Speaker 1: running again. Let me just Google this live.
• 22:29
  Speaker 2: Okay, perfect.
• 22:31
  Speaker 4: The other, the other candidate that stands out to me
• 22:36
  Speaker 4: is Loyal Wooldridge.
• 22:37
  Speaker 2: Because this is a seat that is like, last time
• 22:40
  Speaker 2: it was really, really, really tight.
• 22:41
  Speaker 4: He came within 40 votes of winning the seat. He's
• 22:45
  Speaker 4: a bit of a star in Kelowna. You know, he
• 22:47
  Speaker 4: ran businesses, two-term councillor, chair of the regional district. He's
• 22:53
  Speaker 4: kind of a charisma off the charts kind of guy.
• 22:55
  Speaker 4: So a rematch there that I think will be one
• 22:58
  Speaker 4: to watch. One thing that he had done was advocated
• 23:02
  Speaker 4: for short-term rentals to return to the community, which was
• 23:05
  Speaker 4: a unique strategy for the BCNDP. And of course, that's
• 23:10
  Speaker 4: an advocacy goal that he succeeded on. I don't know
• 23:15
  Speaker 4: too much about the Conservative candidates at this point. it
• 23:20
  Speaker 4: does look like they are trying to roll out some
• 23:22
  Speaker 4: new star candidates. And they will have to, you know,
• 23:28
  Speaker 4: run alongside quite a few incumbents from the Rustad KLF era. So,
• 23:33
  Speaker 4: you know, those folks were sort of happy to embrace
• 23:35
  Speaker 4: Trump-style politics under the last leader. So it'll be interesting
• 23:38
  Speaker 4: to see how they all fare running alongside each other
• 23:41
  Speaker 4: this time around.
• 23:43
  Speaker 1: I don't see George Chao on the NDP team list.
• 23:46
  Speaker 1: So it's possible he just hasn't been announced or he's retired.
• 23:48
  Speaker 1: I'm going to go with retired. Good luck in your
• 23:50
  Speaker 1: future endeavors, George. If you're not running again, prove me wrong,
• 23:54
  Speaker 1: prove me wrong. I'm still here. I can, I'll, I'll
• 23:56
  Speaker 1: correct it on the show, but, uh, I don't see
• 23:57
  Speaker 1: him on there.
• 23:58
  Speaker 3: I will.
• 23:59
  Speaker 1: It is interesting that barely half of the candidates for
• 24:02
  Speaker 1: the NDP have been announced. I think the conservatives have
• 24:04
  Speaker 1: a few more, uh, a week into an election. I
• 24:08
  Speaker 1: don't know if that's usual or unusual with this October
• 24:11
  Speaker 1: the 7th or 10th or somewhere around there as a
• 24:16
  Speaker 1: candidate cutoff date. So there's still time, but a week in, um,
• 24:20
  Speaker 1: There's still a lot of empty nominations.
• 24:24
  Speaker 4: Well, yeah, and I think it's a snap election. So
• 24:27
  Speaker 4: I think a lot of candidates are having to be
• 24:29
  Speaker 4: found on short notice. So it's a little different from
• 24:32
  Speaker 4: last time where there were nomination races and the communications
• 24:36
  Speaker 4: rollout for them were different. But I think sometimes campaigns
• 24:39
  Speaker 4: also try to roll them out in a sequenced way
• 24:43
  Speaker 4: so that they can keep giving profile to the candidates
• 24:46
  Speaker 4: and try to get a little bit of news with it.
• 24:48
  Speaker 2: So I expect lots more to come.
• 24:50
  Speaker 4: In the days ahead.
• 24:51
  Speaker 1: On the conservative side, a few that stood out for me,
• 24:54
  Speaker 1: Daryl Kropp in Abbotsford Mission, a local businessman in part
• 24:57
  Speaker 1: because Abbotsford Mission is where Carolyn Finlay was going to
• 25:01
  Speaker 1: run in the by-election and in fact ran before that
• 25:04
  Speaker 1: by-election was cancelled and Rhian Gaspar who gave up that
• 25:06
  Speaker 1: seat for Carolyn Finlay to run had been on social
• 25:09
  Speaker 1: media saying she hoped to take back the seat, she
• 25:11
  Speaker 1: quit again and the party did not select her as
• 25:14
  Speaker 1: the candidate so perhaps she shows up for 1BC or
• 25:17
  Speaker 1: maybe her career is over, I'm not sure but that
• 25:19
  Speaker 1: was an interesting Move is a candidate, Curtis Whitford in
• 25:23
  Speaker 1: Peace River North, an oil energy executive. He's going to
• 25:26
  Speaker 1: go up against Jordan Keeley, former conservative, now independent, facing
• 25:30
  Speaker 1: a charge of sexual assault during an election campaign, choosing
• 25:33
  Speaker 1: to run again. Saanich South, Kathy Olmsted, a former central
• 25:39
  Speaker 1: Saanich councillor, perhaps best known for owning the Red Barn
• 25:42
  Speaker 1: Market in the past. Delicious wraps at the Red Barn Market.
• 25:45
  Speaker 1: I'm a big fan of the Red Barn Market wraps.
• 25:48
  Speaker 1: Ran for the federal conservatives in the past. Yes, I'm
• 25:52
  Speaker 1: half Red Barn rap most of the time. Saanich North
• 25:56
  Speaker 1: and the Islands, Ryan Windsor, who is the mayor of
• 25:58
  Speaker 1: Central Saanich, who's decided to retire municipally. He's also a
• 26:02
  Speaker 1: former Green, which makes him an interesting person. Jamie Stein,
• 26:07
  Speaker 1: Vancouver Langara, that's a BC United candidate who lost his
• 26:12
  Speaker 1: nomination when the party folded before the last election. The
• 26:15
  Speaker 1: conservatives didn't want to take him. Now they are taking him.
• 26:18
  Speaker 1: So that shows a bit of an interesting and different
• 26:20
  Speaker 1: kind of approach for this campaign. I'm just randomly picking
• 26:24
  Speaker 1: some highlights here. And then a vice president of the Conservatives,
• 26:27
  Speaker 1: Pavneet Singh, running in Kelowna Lake Country Coldstream against Tara Armstrong.
• 26:32
  Speaker 1: I'm not actually sure if Tara Armstrong is running again.
• 26:35
  Speaker 1: The former Conservative turned independent. I checked her feeds and
• 26:39
  Speaker 1: didn't see any announcement from her yet. And then Aileen,
• 26:42
  Speaker 1: I don't think you mentioned Vancouver Fraserview. Did you mention?
• 26:45
  Speaker 3: Yeah, you did.
• 26:46
  Speaker 1: No, sorry.
• 26:46
  Speaker 3: You did.
• 26:47
  Speaker 2: That's Amin.
• 26:49
  Speaker 3: Yes.
• 26:49
  Speaker 1: There's so many writings here. It's going to have to
• 26:52
  Speaker 1: make a spreadsheet. If you have made a spreadsheet out there,
• 26:54
  Speaker 1: feel free to let me know. I'd love to steal yours.
• 26:57
  Speaker 1: I mean, use your spreadsheet just to keep on tap
• 27:00
  Speaker 1: of everything because it changes by the day.
• 27:03
  Speaker 2: Okay.
• 27:03
  Speaker 1: Long show. Lots to talk about. Aileen, thanks so much
• 27:07
  Speaker 1: for being here.
• 27:08
  Speaker 2: Thanks, Rob.
• 27:09
  Speaker 1: And thank you, everyone, for listening. Make sure you subscribe.
• 27:12
  Speaker 1: We'll be back tomorrow with all the latest in BC
• 27:15
  Speaker 1: politics here on Political Capital Daily.