How a provincial leadership race could reshape Indigenous reconciliation and determine Canada’s economic future – CTV News
January 14, 2026
It is rare that a provincial opposition party leadership race has the potential to shift the national dialogue on a fundamental issue for the country, but that could be about to happen in British Columbia as the official opposition B.C. Conservative Party leadership race gets underway this month.
Let me unpack this a bit. For those not from B.C., politically, the province has long been a very polarized, typically closely contested, two-party province come election time. On one side are B.C. New Democrats, the other the B.C. Conservatives/Liberals over the past 30 years.
Elections in B.C. are typically close affairs in terms of the popular vote, but because it is a binary choice (apart from southern Vancouver Island where the Greens have support) only slight margins in the popular vote can result in a massive mandate in the legislature’s seat count.
