XPost: bc.politics, van.general, vic.general   
      
   Take a look at what 'income level' voters are still sticking with the taxing   
   Gordon   
   Campbell 'Liberals'.   
   ____________________________________   
      
   HST backlash could prove to be B.C. Liberals’ Waterloo   
      
   After three consecutive election victories, Premier Gordon Campbell is facing   
   his toughest   
   fight ever   
      
   Victoria and Vancouver — From Saturday's Globe and Mail   
   Last updated on Monday, May. 31, 2010   
      
   Scott Nelson has impeccable B.C. Liberal credentials: The former mayor of   
   Williams Lake   
   joined the party in 1993 to help Gordon Campbell win the party leadership. He   
   sat on the   
   provincial council. Last year, he sought a nomination to run in the last   
   election as part   
   of the Gordon Campbell team.   
      
   This weekend, Mr. Nelson will be out canvassing for signatures on the petition   
   to repeal   
   the harmonized sales tax – the campaign that threatens to fracture the   
   coalition that has   
   produced Mr. Campbell’s three straight electoral victories.   
      
   In the span of one year, the BC Liberals have lost more than a third of their   
   committed   
   voters, largely due to the public backlash over the HST. “This is something   
   that could   
   seriously affect the [Liberal] base,” said pollster Mario Canseco.   
      
   In B.C.’s political landscape, it doesn’t take much to tip the balance of   
   power, and those   
   core supporters must be reclaimed – or the HST may prove to be the Liberals’   
   Waterloo.   
      
   “B.C. Liberal members are mad and angry and very disappointed,” said Mr.   
   Nelson, who is   
   still a card-carrying party member. His longtime loyalty to the Premier earned   
   him a   
   personal call from Mr. Campbell, seeking to dissuade him from joining the   
   allied forces   
   against the HST. Mr. Nelson didn’t budge.   
      
   “The government in its arrogance has chosen to ignore the overwhelming wishes   
   of people,”   
   he said. “I don’t believe people will forgive Gordon Campbell.”   
      
   This week, Mr. Campbell conceded for the first time that the anti-HST petition   
   is likely   
   to be successful, but insisted it would be wrong to try to back out of the   
   deal with   
   Ottawa. His government may be forced to rethink that soon, however: On Friday,   
   the   
   petition’s organizers announced they now have enough signatures – 10 per cent   
   of eligible   
   voters – in all 85 ridings of the province to succeed as a citizen initiative   
   under the   
   B.C. Elections Act.   
      
   A posse of Liberal cabinet ministers and backbenchers are meeting behind   
   closed doors with   
   party members in the Interior on Saturday to try to calm the troops. Steve   
   Forseth, an   
   executive member of the party’s Cariboo-Chilcotin Riding Association, says the   
   membership   
   needs to hear a solid plan to dig the party out of this mess. “Those who come   
   out and say   
   recall is not a threat, they need to wake up and smell the coffee,” he said.   
      
   The Premier, however, brushed aside the suggestion that he needs to do any   
   special   
   outreach to the Liberal base. “I think we have to go and talk with all British   
    Columbians,” he said. “I certainly intend to go around the province to talk   
   to people   
   about why every British Columbian is going to benefit from this change.”   
      
   Brenda Locke once served in Mr. Campbell’s cabinet, but she didn’t rate a   
   personal call   
   from the Premier when she began campaigning against the HST. Her organization,   
   the Massage   
   Therapists Association of BC, was one of several that received assurances from   
   the   
   Liberals during the last election that the HST wasn’t in the cards.   
      
   “It definitely was disingenuous,” said Ms. Locke, who hasn’t renewed her party   
   membership.   
   “It’s a challenge for lots of Liberals to understand and feel any kind of   
   comfort level   
   with.”   
      
   Mr. Canseco, a vice-president with Angus Reid Public Opinion, said the only   
   demographic   
   where the Liberals have not seen a double-digit drop in support since the last   
   election is   
   among voters with yearly household incomes of $100,000 or more, who tend to   
   shun the New   
   Democratic Party.   
      
   If a substantial portion of the base doesn’t come back, he said, “there will   
   be no   
   rebound.”   
      
   Mr. Campbell’s coalition has long been united by the fear of seeing the NDP   
   return to   
   government. The leader of the anti-HST petition, former Social Credit premier   
   Bill Vander   
   Zalm, now says the prospect of another NDP government isn’t looking so scary.   
   “I don’t think they are doing a whole lot better than the NDP did,” he said.   
   “Our debt has   
   grown, our deficits are bigger than ever, they haven’t been truthful.”   
      
   The polls aren’t the only measure of the Liberals’ fortunes. Next month Mr.   
   Campbell will   
   host his annual leader’s dinner, and he’ll need to show he can still pull in a   
   crowd: The   
   $350-a-plate fundraiser for the party usually draws between 1,000 and 1,200   
   guests.   
      
   Party spokesman Chad Pederson said ticket sales are proceeding at their usual   
   pace without   
   any sign that the HST controversy has deterred some attendees. He is confident   
   the spectre   
   of a renewed NDP will continue to unite supporters. He noted that the Liberals   
   are the   
   free-enterprise alternative to the NDP in B.C.   
      
   “A free-enterprise vote for any party other than our own shows us from history   
   that an NDP   
   government will be the result,” he said.   
      
   The BC Conservative Party, which does not have any members in the legislature,   
   has seen   
   its party membership double in the last year, with most of the influx coming   
   in the last   
   three months, says Dean Skoreyko, a party spokesman. He declined to provide   
   specific   
   numbers.   
      
   Conservative-minded voters, including federal Tories, who have supported the   
   provincial   
   Liberals are taking a new look at the B.C. Conservatives because they are   
   questioning the   
   conservative credentials of the Liberals, Mr. Skoreyko said from his home in   
   Vernon. Mr.   
   Campbell’s party has no link to the federal Liberals, and has been seen as a   
   kind of   
   free-enterprise coalition of political interests that includes federal   
   Liberals and former   
   Socreds.   
      
   Mr. Skoreyko questions the existence of a solid Liberal base. “I don’t think   
   there is a   
   history or a base that they can rely on to stick through in tough times,” he   
   said. “If you   
   don’t have an ideological pole to dance around, what you have then is factions   
   and nobody   
   has any loyalty.”   
      
   It’s been a year since Finance Minister Colin Hansen persuaded his colleagues   
   in the   
   cabinet that the HST was the way to go. Today, he’s still trying to persuade   
   British   
   Columbians he was right, and the polls show a majority don’t agree.   
      
   “I believe we could have spent millions of dollars on paid advertising and it   
   would have   
   not have made any difference,” Mr. Hansen said. “We have to get into   
   implementation so   
   that people are experiencing it and realizing this is not as big an impact on   
   their budget   
   as they had been led to believe.”   
      
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