VICTORIA -- Now that two members of the B.C. New Democratic Party caucus are competing to run federally, Opposition leader John Horgan has laid down some "rules of engagement" to minimize friction on the provincial scene.
Horgan expects the duo -- Jenny Kwan and Mable Elmore -- to fulfil their MLA duties on a full-time basis and work only "in their spare time" on their drives for the party's nomination in the federal riding of Vancouver East.
But he has no intention of asking Kwan or Elmore to resign her provincial seat before the federal nomination process plays itself out, and the date has not yet been set.
He further suggested that the winner could remain at her post as a provincial MLA until the federal election campaign gets underway this fall.
Talking to reporters Monday, Horgan referred only to the requirement in the Canada Elections Act that would oblige a provincial elected member to resign upon filing papers to run officially for federal office. Filing day in a federal campaign is three weeks before voting day, currently scheduled for Oct. 19.
Horgan has quietly discouraged Kwan and Elmore from lining up endorsements from other provincial MLAs in hopes of minimizing the stress lines in a caucus still smarting from the unexpected loss of the last election.
But he rejected suggestions from reporters that it is a sign of low morale in the provincial caucus that two members would appear to want out.
"I've spoken to both of them," said Horgan. "I don't believe that's the case." Rather, the two are running because Vancouver East is a "unique" and "iconic" seat for New Democrats.
Vancouver East voters have elected New Democrats (or members of its predecessor, the Co-operative Commonwealth Federation) in every election save two since the seat was established in 1933.
The provincial turf, now split between two separate ridings (including the one Kwan represents in the legislature) is no less reliable for the party. It went CCF/NDP in every provincial election since 1933, including the near-wipeout in 2001. (One exception: in 1956, the then two-member provincial riding somehow managed to return one CCFer and one Socred.).
Granted, a lock on the NDP nomination in Vancouver East is the closest thing to a lock on a seat in the House of Commons.
Still, Elmore and Kwan were probably inclined to look further afield because they don't see themselves fitting into a Horgan-led provincial caucus. Neither snagged a major posting when the new leader shuffled his shadow cabinet last summer.
Kwan is lead Opposition critic for Community Living B.C., Elmore for the Insurance Corp. of B.C. Kwan got to ask only a half-dozen questions in the fall session of the legislature; Elmore a mere three.
Nor did either of them figure in the lineup when Horgan named the equivalent of his 2014 all-star team: MLAs Carole James, David Eby, Michelle Mungall, Selina Robinson and Mike Farnworth.
"These are the five who have been performing the best by me so far," he told reporter Dirk Meissner of The Canadian Press in a comment that fell somewhat short of a textbook strategy for building team spirit in the caucus room.
Horgan insisted he would be sorry to lose Elmore or Kwan. "Either would be difficult to replace."
Privately, I expect he would prefer to be looking for a replacement for Kwan.
Horgan was furious with her back in 2010 when she played a pivotal, publicly treacherous, role in forcing out then-leader Carole James.
Then there was the embarrassment to the party last year, when Kwan was caught out for having taken vacations to Disneyland and Europe at the expense of the Portland Hotel Society, a poverty agency where her then-husband worked as a manager.
Kwan paid $35,000 in redress out of her own pocket. Still, her effectiveness as a critic was gone, with government members joking that if she pressed too hard in question period, they'd fire back: "That's a Mickey Mouse question."
But as one prominent New Democrat put it this week, a seat in the federal parliament could give Kwan an opportunity for a fresh start. But not necessarily an easy one: as the divorced mother of two young children, the travel to and from Ottawa would be a relentless grind.
Elmore, whose Vancouver-Kensington riding is also on the city's east side, got a head start on the nomination fight by announcing her bid the week before Christmas.
She's a proven, if somewhat controversial organizer, having been caught stapling $10 bills to last-minute membership forms in the 2011 leadership race, where she supported Adrian Dix. "Mable the Staple," they called her.
Kwan, who announced Sunday, would appear to have the advantage in terms of "name" supporters, including ex-MLA Bob Williams, native leader Stewart Phillip, and Steve Hunt of the Steelworkers.
Where Elmore's ethnic roots are in the Filipino community, Kwan's are among Chinese-Canadians. In Vancouver East, the latter outnumber the former four to one, according to Stats Canada data reported in The Vancouver Sun recently by Peter O'Neil.
Advantage Kwan. Should she be moving on to Ottawa in the fall, she would be vacating a provincial seat where winning has also been a foregone conclusion for New Democrats over the years.
In that event, John Horgan could hope to recruit a less tarnished replacement, perhaps even another all-star, for a byelection that would have to be held within six months.
