Brennan Day: B.C. conservatives, we need to get our act together

Legislature in Victoria, B.C. Photo by motimeiri /Getty Images

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British Columbia does not need another summit to determine whether there is room for a serious free-enterprise political alternative in this province. They’ve held the meetings, seen the polling, heard from the strategists and endured enough Twitter threads to constitute cruel and unusual punishment. They’ve even held a “Triple O Summit” in the basement of a White Spot.

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As it stands, there are currently three free-enterprise parties in B.C., including the Conservatives, and parties being led by former party members. Now that Kerry-Lynne Findlay has resigned as B.C. Conservative leader, I think everyone’s on the same page. There is a problem. Now can we please get on with solving it?

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This is directed at everyone trying to figure out what comes next, myself included.

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We need to get our act together.

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The ridiculous part is that most of us agree on the important things. Government should live within its means. Prosperity has to be created before it can be redistributed. We want safe communities, functioning public services, private property protections, individual freedom and a province where people are rewarded for building something or creating a job.

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Good people can disagree beyond that. That’s politics.

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What we cannot do is create three versions of the same political project and arrive at the next election explaining why our fiscally responsible, socially reasonable, pro-resource party is completely different from those running the fiscally responsible, socially reasonable, pro-resource party next door.

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While we do that, NDP Premier David Eby gets another free pass.

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U.S. President Donald Trump handed the NDP the political gift of a lifetime. His threats and tariffs deserve condemnation. But he did not create our housing crisis, shortage of doctors, permitting problems or govern B.C. while mills closed.

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Problems made in British Columbia need solutions made in British Columbia.

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Forestry workers want mills running. Mining and construction need investment. Families want to afford a home, find a doctor and believe their kids can build a future here.

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Nobody outside politics cares which operative won an argument on Twitter last Tuesday.

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So enough.

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The people building these organizations need to sit down together. And before anyone mistakes this for a B.C. Liberal reunion, it isn’t. The Conservative party needs a chair at the table, as do the new alternatives being built and people who understand how the old coalition held together people who didn’t agree on everything but agreed on enough to govern.

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Nobody gets excluded because somebody else doesn’t like their jersey. That’s rather the point.