Well, that didn鈥檛 take long. It appears the knives are out for Adrian Dix, leader of the sa国际传媒 New Democratic Party. After his party鈥檚 shocking defeat in the provincial election two months ago, Dix gave no indication of quitting. Indeed, he made clear it was his intention to stay on.
But if Dix wants to keep his job, he鈥檒l have to face a leadership review at the party鈥檚 convention in November. Well-placed insiders are saying publicly he should swallow his pride and bow out. Animosity toward him is too high.
Ex-NDP MLA Guy Gentner, who lost his Delta North seat, put it this way: 鈥淚 understand the need to get through the rest of this legislative session, followed by a friendly goodbye in August. Then new leadership is required. If not, this party could tear itself apart. There鈥檚 nothing worse than a civil war.鈥�
Civil war? This would be a good moment for New Democrats to take a deep breath and reflect. The next election is four years away.
If a leadership contest is cobbled together in the shadows of defeat, the result won鈥檛 be pretty. It鈥檚 just over two years since Dix鈥檚 predecessor, Carole James, was shown the door.
With the party still reeling, and its more cannibalistic instincts on display, this is the worst moment to recruit a new leader.
A change at the top might be needed, but it will take time, and a recovery in the polls, to attract someone good. After losing the 2011 election, the federal Liberals waited two years before handing Justin Trudeau the reins.
Instead of personalities, the New Democrats should take a long, hard look at their platform. They鈥檝e lost four elections in a row, with three different leaders.
This last defeat, in particular, was ominous. A geographic divide has opened between the two major parties.
With only a handful of exceptions, the ridings that went NDP are on Vancouver Island or around central Vancouver.
Wide swaths of the province, including the vote-rich suburbs in the Lower Mainland, and most of the Interior, swung Liberal.
And in this instance, geography is everything. Those sectors of the province now owned by the Liberals are more likely to have rapid population growth 鈥� the bedroom communities outside Vancouver, the Fraser Valley and the Okanagan.
Much of the NDP vote is concentrated in areas with slower growth rates, such as Victoria, or outright decline 鈥� Prince Rupert and Kitimat.
With trend lines like these, it is essential for New Democrats to change more than their leader. They need a platform with broader appeal.
For a brief moment, it appeared this message had sunk in. The party鈥檚 executive appointed a five-member panel to examine the election loss and propose some new ideas.
But when the details emerged, it turned out four of the five panelists had union backgrounds (the fifth is a student), there was no representative from business, and no one had financial training.
This isn鈥檛 the sort of group you ask to carry out a serious self-scrutiny. Its members have too much invested in the status quo.
Dix, meanwhile, has talked about the need to 鈥渞ebrand鈥� the party. We鈥檙e not sure what that means, but it sounds more like a sales pitch than substance.
For parliamentary government to work, there must be an opposition party ready and able to take over.
As things stand, the New Democrats occupy part of that role 鈥� they are still the opposition. But without some honest heart-searching, time and demography are against them.
The NDP machine has won only three elections in our province鈥檚 history. If the party hopes to win a fourth, a complete rethink is required.
