RANDALL WHITE, CANADIAN PROVINCES NOTEBOOK, TORONTO. TUESDAY, OCTOBER 29, 2024. The final count on the October 19 BC election results is now complete..

In round numbers : David Eby’s BC NDP has 45% of the popular vote and 47 seats in the BC Legislative Assembly (where a bare majority is also 47 seats) ; John Rustad’s Conservatives have 43% of the vote and 44 seats ; and Sonia Furstenau’s BC Green Party has 8% of the vote and 2 seats.

Based on these numbers David Eby has advised Lieutenant Governor Janet Austin “that he is prepared to continue as Premier of British Columbia.” And Lieutenant Governor Austin has noted that that this follows “assurances from Elections BC of the results of the final count” of the October 19 election.

Moreover, as the CBC’s Ian Hanomansing posted late last night : “From BC Conservative leader John Rustad tonight as he concedes election to the NDP: ‘I accept the results of this election. I thank our Elections BC workers for their hard and dedicated work.’”

As noted by Alec Lazenby in the Vancouver Sun : “Experts say the final outcome is far from settled, however, with Surrey-Guildford and Kelowna Centre subject to judicial recounts in the coming days.”

From Premier Eby’s standpoint, these judicial recounts in two districts (finally won by well under 100 votes) could bring a return to recurrent results before the absolutely final count. Here the NDP had 46 seats and the Conservatives 45.

This would be much like what followed the 2017 BC election, when a Green Party with three seats agreed to give a New Democrat minority government a majority in the Legislative Assembly as required.

Even if the 2024 Eby New Democrats do retain a bare 47-seat majority in the Assembly all by themselves, the traditional role of the Speaker, usually selected from the governing party, could make it hard for Premier Eby to pass much legislation without Green Party support.

(And the parallel NDP/Green supply and confidence agreement after the 2017 election — between then NDP Premier John Horgan and Green leader Andrew Weaver — finally lasted all the way to October 2020.)

Meanwhile, in yesterday’s Saskatchewan provincial election, Scott Moe’s Saskatchewan Party managed to hang onto office yet again. Carla Beck’s New Democrats did better than they have for some time. But on the October 28 First Preliminary Count the Saskatchewan Party won 35 seats with 53% of the popular vote. The NDP won 26 seats with 40% of the vote. (And 31 seats is a bare majority in the Saskatchewan Legislative Assembly.)

Western Canada will continue to enjoy two conservative and two progressive provincial governments. The wistful dream of three progressive governments among the four provinces has vanished.

(Meanwhile again, there will suddenly be a snap Nova Scotia election next month, called by a Conservative premier looking to avoid the recent Conservative crash in New Brunswick : but that is another thing altogether.)