BC NDP: Who should be the next leader? II

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Fri, 2010-12-10 14:53

Stockholm

This is interesting:

http://communities.canada.com/vancouversun/blogs/viewfromtheledge/archiv...

New Democratic Party MLA Mike Farnworth says the party needs to exercise caution in picking an interim leader in January because he/she may need to lead the party into a snap provincial election.

"When you're looking at who should be interim leader, I think there are a number of things that need to be taken into consideration," Farnworth told me during an interview on Voice of B.C. on Shaw TV. " One is the ability to work with the caucus -- be the face of the caucus during the interim-leader period.

" But also there's one very important situation. That is if the Liberals decided to call a snap election before we selected our permanent leader, then the interim leader would be the one who leads the party into an election. That's also an important consideration."

Fri, 2010-12-10 16:37

#103

haydukelives

I thought Carole James was going to be the interim leader, but I see that is not the case. That's foolish. Many of the likely candidates for interim leader probably have leadership ambitions.

Fri, 2010-12-10 17:32

#104

Stockholm

Carole James is the interim interim leader (she will be leader until an interim leader is chosen after the holidays). Its not inconceivable that the BC NDP could end up with an interim leader who winds up being the permanent leader. I believe that when the Nova Scotia NDP deposed Helen McDonald - Darrel Dexter was named interim leader - orginally with the idea that he would not run for the leadership (I think) - but then everyone got used to him and i think that he wound up becoming leader by acclamation.

Farnworth makes a valid point that there is a chance that the interim leader could end up being leader in an election campaign - so you don't want to get stuck with someone who is clearly just a caretaker. But, let's say that (hypothetically) Farnworth has by far the most support in caucus to be interim leader - and he also wants to run for the leadership - what happens? Keep in mind that when Stephane Dion quit in Oct. '08 but was going to remain Liberal leader until May it created all kinds of problems for the coalition - and then he quit and Ignatieff became the interim leader - but he also scared anyone else from running against him when the Liberals had their may '09 convention.

Fri, 2010-12-10 19:05

#105

kropotkin1951

Stockholm wrote:

As much as I like Libby Davies - she would not have made a credible BC NDP leader. Her political interests seem to be almost exclusively centred around issues that fall in the domaine of federal politics - many of which are issues that would regarded by the most of the public as esoteric (ie: sex trade workers, safe injection sites, the Middle East etc...). The leader of the BC NDP has to be someone with a VAST ENCYCLOPEDIC familiarity with all the major provincial dossiers - forestry, fisheries, education, health care, economic management, fiscal policy, balancing environmental and economic considerations, infrastructure and transportation planning. If the biggest knock against Carole James was that she didn't give people confidence that she would be able to "manage the economy" - the solution is not to pick a leader who makes Carole James look like she's a nominee for the Nobel Prize in economics. let's get real.

Quote:

WE should be very concerned that the leader of provincial party might not be doctrinaire enough on Afghanistan. If you want to attack Dawn Black surely you can do better than that.

Tell me, when someone is running for the school board in Brandon Manitoba - do you grill them on whether they support sanctions against Myanmar?

LOL Your biases are showing again.

Fri, 2010-12-10 19:20

#106

Catchfire

Closing for length. Please continue here.

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