Boultbee defection: One MLA changes the balance of power

The NDP’s at times precarious hold on power in the legislature has suddenly become a lot tighter with the decision by Independent MLA Amelia Boultbee to join that party and [...]

The NDP’s at times precarious hold on power in the legislature has suddenly become a lot tighter with the decision by Independent MLA Amelia Boultbee to join that party and sit in the NDP caucus. Boultbee’s move gives the NDP 48 seats in the 93-seat legislature, which is a much stronger majority than was previously the case. Because NDP MLA Raj Chouhan is the Speaker (who only votes on certain, rare occasions), it meant the governing party did not have a working majority in the House.

As a result, during the last session more than a dozen votes ended in a 46-46 tie. The government had to attach “confidence” to a bunch of bills to open the door procedurally to allow Chouhan to cast the deciding vote in favour of the government. Losing a confidence vote means the government falls from power and potentially triggers an election.

So, on numerous occasions the NDP was literally a single vote away from a political disaster. Not so anymore. “It’s huge,” an obviously delighted Mike Farnworth, the Government House Leader, recently told me.

“It’s very significant and allows us to run the House much more efficiently.” Boultbee gives Farnworth a major weapon in the House. He can now bring in what is known as “time allocation” to limit debate near the end of a legislative session to wrap up business by the designated day of adjournment (the Opposition refers to this as the “guillotine”).

Previously, Farnworth’s hands were effectively tied because Chouhan could not vote to break a tie on that matter because the Speaker cannot vote to limit debate. But Boultbee’s move potentially goes beyond the goings on at the B.C. legislature. The NDP now has another seat in the Okanagan region, and it is a competitive one.

Boultbee won the seat as a B.C. Conservative by less than 350 votes over the NDP candidate in the 2024 election. There is also the way Boultbee explained her decision to join the NDP, and this too could have implications come election time. Although she was elected as a member of what she considered to be a center-right political party, she feels that party has moved way too far to the right.

At a news conference at the legislature where she was backed by about a dozen NDP MLAs, Boultbee attacked her former party and said she now wants “to be part of the solution.” “The party I was first elected with was promised to me and many others as a big-tent party, but it gets smaller by the day,” she told reporters, and took a shot at new B.C. Conservative leader Kerry-Lynne Findlay, saying she was more interested in “divisive Donald Trump-style populism than with things that actually matter to people.”

She may yet emerge as an effective critic of the B.C. Conservatives, since she has no history of being associated with the NDP and so her critiques may hold more water for many voters. With Boultbee now firmly in hand, Premier David Eby and his government can breathe a lot easier. The possibility of losing power in the legislature and triggering a risky election is a lot less likely.

Keith Baldrey is the legislature bureau chief for Global BC Keith.Baldrey@globalnews.ca