Green Party Forecast: Fair to Middling

Interim BC Green Party Christopher Bennett thinks that the candidates running to lead his party should pull the Greens to the centre. Once upon a time, this page actually pulled a little towards the Greens. In the dark, soul-crushing days of the 2001 election campaign, this page actually considered supporting the Green Party, up until got into a screaming match with one their candidates at the Park Royal shopping mall. Any party who runs a candidate who barks at me that Unions "destroyed" British Columbia and Mike Harris did "great things" for Ontario is not the party for me.

The thing Bennett doesn't realize is that unlike the rest of the country where some form of the family compact still exists, British Columbia really has no political "centre". There's the right (The Liberal party formerly known as Social Credit), the left (the New Democrats), and anything else just fractures the vote and lets one side win more easily. One party is the party of the wealthy elite (and those who aspire to be like them), and the other is the party of working people and the less advantaged we need to take care of because the wealthy elite won't.

The Greens are using environmental issues to wedge themselves into the picture, but ever since the Industrial, Wood and Allied Workers' Union (IWA) split from the Labour Movement, they volunteered to be a rat union for Regional Health Authorities, started raiding the Hospital Employees Union, and Dave Haggard started kissing up to Paul Martin, nobody in the NDP really cares what the IWA thinks anymore, which allows the party to match the Greens on environmental issues. The only difference is that Greens prefer market-based incentive solutions which may not see results in our lifetime, whereas New Democrats aren't afraid to legislate necessary reforms before the environmental damage gets worse.

The NDP has made its own efforts in reaching out to small business people, and in many cases (like Vancouver-Fairview MLA Gregor Robertson) successfully converted them from the inconsistencies of the Green agenda. The Greens however, have never really dealt with their antipathy towards unions. In 2001, Adrienne Carr and Gordon Campbell were lockstep in busting nurses' and teachers' unions, and despite Carr's showing up at HEU rallies after Bill 29, workers weren't fooled and rallied solidly behind the NDP in 2005, taking back votes from the Greens, beating Carr in her own riding, and forcing her resignation as party leader.

If Bennett really wants the Greens to capitalize on disaffected Liberal voters, this page says more power to them. However, I don't see where he thinks there are disaffected New Democrats, beyond the backseat drivers who want to show Carole James the door when the poll numbers are a little weak after a blizzard of bullsh*t Liberal propaganda. As Gordon Campbell's love-in with Arnold Schwarzenegger illustrated, this province already has a party of capitalist greenwashers. We also have a party of progressive social democrats who, give or take a few Surrey MLA's who need a little shake about The Gateway Project, match the Greens on the environment.

Given the reality of the situation, what could the Greens offer BC voters? The candidate who can best answer that question is the one Green Party members should support, not the one most likely to travel in Business Class like Bennett sees it.