'I personally couldn't do it': Falcon said principles would stop him from supporting BC Conservatives

Kevin Falcon has thrown his support behind the BC Conservatives just weeks after telling Chilliwack podcaster and FVC collaborator Aaron Pete that his principles would stop him from ever doing such a thing.

In an interview published Monday and conducted on August 12, two weeks before Falcon suddenly announced he would end his campaign and urge people to vote for the Conservatives, the BC United leader was asked about candidates deserting his party.

Falcon said that it was “not possible” for him to back the BC Conservatives over his own party because doing so would be to throw his principles out the window.

“A lot of the people that leave are first time MLAs or people that are panicking because of the polls … and I understand it, I just think it’s a big mistake because I think principles are really important too in politics.”

Falcon continued (you can watch the segment here):

“I’m a very principled leader and I believe that you need to guide yourself as a party by principles too. And to throw those out the window—you know, I’ve had colleagues that have gone to join the BC Conservatives that have told me things about that party, how much they despise the leader and their candidates and they’re wingnuts and all this stuff. And next thing you know, they find themselves over there. I don’t know how they do that. I personally couldn’t. It would be like me agreeing to go over and join the NDP. I could never do that. It’s just not possible. But, you know, people have to live by their own decisions and I’m fine with that. But I think a lot of it is driven by their concern about their own situation.”

Earlier in the interview, Pete asked Falcon how it felt to be accused by a commentator of having destroyed the BC Liberal Party and splitting the right-of-centre vote.

In response, Falcon suggested that the Conservatives were unlikely to appeal to British Columbians.

“It’s a party that has a lot of candidates that, frankly are very fringe candidates that hold views that are not mainstream views in British Columbia. They’ve already had to fire at least four of their candidates. There will be more, I guarantee you that.”

He continued: “I’m going to prove a lot of people wrong because they spend too much time focusing on polls… I say to people, ‘Wait ‘til the campaign.’ Nothing matters until the campaign.”

The demise of BC United came 16 months after the party changed its name from the BC Liberals. Although the party was already doing poorly in the polls, it was still leading the BC Conservatives at the time.

The abandonment of the BC Liberal name, which some worried overly associated the party with the unpopular federal Liberals, was seen as a victory at the time for Falcon.

But after Falcon enthusiastically changed his party’s name to BC United, the party’s support collapsed, with voters, staffers, and even some MLAs fleeing to the surging BC Conservatives.

With polls suggesting many of his party’s former voters didn’t know about its new name, BC United asked to have ballots specify that BC United was formerly the BC Liberal Party—a move that seems at odds with the original rationale for the name change. That application took place shortly before Falcon spoke to Pete in mid-August.

In his interview with Pete, Falcon ducked responsibility for the disastrous rebranding strategy, saying he had doubts about the plan, but went along with it anyways.

“The company that did our branding made the case, you just flip the switch and go over to the new world and don’t worry about the connection,” Falcon told Pete. “I was always uncomfortable with that because I felt ‘Well wait a minute there are a lot of people who need to know.’”

But Falcon said he was persuaded not to worry about linking the current name with the discarded one.

“At the end of the day, they convinced us ‘Just go to the new name, you’ll be fine.’”

“We’re like ‘Well now you know what, we need to make sure there’s a reminder for folks.’”

Falcon also blamed the NDP for introducing new campaign finance rules that he said hindered his party’s ability to raise money to promote its new brand. Those rules only permit political donations by individuals, and not companies and unions. This spring, the BC Conservatives raised more money than Falcon’s party.

In their long-form conversation before the bombshell announcement, Pete asked Falcon about drug policies, his position on Indigenous land title, BC’s housing crisis, and health care reform.

You can watch the entire interview below. Pete has also interviewed the leaders of the BC Conservative, New Democratic, and Green parties. We will be featuring those interviews as they are rolled out over the coming weeks.