BC Liberal leadership candidates are seeking corporate donors and recruiting influential business leaders to help them raise the $450,000 they’re limited to spending during the campaign and win the February 26 contest.
“$450,000 is a lot of money if it’s in your bank account, or mine, but to operate a campaign provincially, it’s not a lot of money,” George Abbott recently joked in a conversation with Business in Vancouver.
Abbott and the campaign’s perceived front-runners – Christy Clark and Kevin Falcon – are expected to spend $450,000 during the campaign, whereas Mike de Jong said he would likely spend about $400,000.
Moira Stilwell is expected to spend less than that.
As of press time, none of the campaigns had yet raised $450,000.
“I’m providing significant support [to Falcon] and our company will,” said Beedie Group president Ryan Beedie. “I’ve been friends with Kevin for 25 years. I met him on my second day at Simon Fraser University (SFU) and then we sat in student government together. I was the business representative and Kevin was political science representative.”
Clark was also active in SFU politics in her early 20s and Beedie knew her when she was internal relations officer of the Simon Fraser Student Society (SFSS) student government.
Clark was later elected SFSS president but was only able to serve in that position for one day because she didn’t pay an election fine for having posters up on the day of the vote. She was then deemed a “student in bad standing,” according to the university and was ineligible to serve as SFSS president.
“You’ve got lots of good candidates running,” Beedie said. “Christy is a good candidate. You’ve got George. These are good people.”
Beedie favours Falcon because he believes Falcon has best demonstrated that he has the traits of a CEO.
“Kevin has massive support within the membership of the Young Presidents’ Organization,” Beedie said. “Look at what was accomplished on his watch – on time and on budget. There was the Sea-to-Sky Highway expansion, the Canada Line, Kicking Horse Canyon Highway improvement project. It was massive expansion and he did it effectively and capably with no controversies. He has a solid track record.”
Clark’s backers include condo marketing whiz and Rennie Marketing Systems director Bob Rennie and developers Peter Wall and Bruno Wall.
Rennie met Clark for coffee the week before she announced her candidacy and he left impressed.
Rennie had previously been meeting other candidates and presumed candidates, such as Rich Coleman, but decided to support Clark in part because she’s an outsider who represents change.
“George is a consensus builder and a pragmatist,” said Curis Resources Ltd. CEO Mike McPhie, who told BIV that he is contemplating donating money to Abbott’s campaign.
“His experience in a broad range of portfolios makes him a strong candidate.”
McPhie first met Abbott when Abbott was minister of sustainable resource management and McPhie was the CEO of the Mining Association of British Columbia.
He believes that Abbott has a strong grasp of policy in various ministries but is particularly astute when it comes to the resource sector, which is vital for the province to generate what McPhie called “that first dollar” in the economy, which then gets circulated and stimulates other sectors.
Pascal Spothelfer, president and CEO of the British Columbia Technology Industry Association, said his association is non-partisan and neutral in the leadership race.
Personally, however, he is considering donating to Stilwell’s campaign.
“She went into politics for the right reasons,” Spothelfer said of Stilwell, who has a mere 19 months’ experience as an MLA and 18 months as a cabinet minister.
“Moira’s not a career politician. From that point of view, she sets an example. We often say, ‘These things should be changed.’ She actually stuck her neck out to affect changes. I find her incredibly smart and to be somebody who really listens and wants input. She then has the ability to process that input in a very sensible way.”