WATCH: After a hard-fought B.C. election campaign, two of the three party leaders visit Vancouver Island in a final push for votes. Tess van Straaten reports.
On the last day of the B.C. election campaign, Christy Clark made a final push for votes on Vancouver Island.
“This is a great chance for the B.C. Liberals to take back seats on the Island and having the premier here is a sign of that,” says Saanich North and the Islands Liberal candidate Stephen Roberts, who was campaigning with Clark in Sidney Monday afternoon.
But along with all the cheers for Clark as she walked down the street, here were also jeers for the B.C. Liberal leader.
“We came down here to try to talk to Christy because she doesn’t talk to us and she hasn’t apologized to teachers for the hurt that she’s caused,” says Parkland teacher librarian Aaron Mueller, who was on a professional development day.
“I definitely wanted to make the point that this isn’t going to be an easy photo op,” says protester Dock Currie who plans to vote NDP.
B.C. Green Party leader Andrew Weaver was also campaigning in Sidney on the last day of the campaign, hoping to pick up the North Saanich riding.
It made history last election as the closest three-way race in the province in modern times.
The Greens are hoping to win it this time and pick up at least two other ridings in addition to Weaver’s seat to gain official party status.
“The B.C. Greens are surging across the province as people realize for the first time in a generation they actually have something to vote for, not against,” Weaver told CHEK News from the campaign trail in Sidney.
The NDP’s John Horgan was the only leader not to come to the Island, opting instead to spend the last day of the campaign on the Lower Mainland.
“We can’t afford four more years of Clark,” Horgan told supporters. “That’s the message we want people to hear.”
For Clark, who campaigned in the Comox Valley and Richmond Monday morning, the message hasn’t changed:
“I have spent every day of this campaign talking about jobs because at the end of the day for me, a job means hope for our kids,” Clark told reporters in Richmond.
Clark’s team says the Liberal leader has logged more than 12,500 kilometres on this election campaign ? more than last election ? visiting 50 different communities.
The Liberals say they’re hopeful crisscrossing the province will pay.
But with an estimated nine per cent of voters still undecided and many pollsters saying the election is too close to call, it might just come down to who does the best job of getting supporters to the polls.
Tess van Straaten
