The Written Word
for November 21, 1999

The battle lines for the NDP leadership race are now drawn with four serious candidates for the NDP rank and file to choose from.

Let’s look at them as we might look at horses in a race and try to handicap them.

The first in and the longest shot is Corky Evans. He has no real chance – not even a come from behind win to catch faltering leaders. He represents a very strong constituency, however, and that cannot be forgotten. He may be in the position of King maker for the last ballot … if it gets past the first ballot. The most likely reason Mr Evans is in the race is to preserve his own place in the government which one might remember came about in the first place because he ran in the race to succeed Mike Harcourt. I’d mark him as 25-1.

Let’s look at Joy McPhail. She has some serious pluses. She is a woman, an attractive person with personality if not outright charisma and has some serious backing from labour. Her drawbacks involve her budgets, especially the last one that bids fair to go a billion and a half in the hole. She did resign over the Clark mess but she did so just in time to avoid the bloodshed which might seem smart to some but which looks like desertion to others. Make her 5-1.

Also at 5-1 I’d put Gordon Wilson. He brings many pluses including, up until now at any rate, popularity with voters. He has considerable debating skills which drive fear into the minds of many Liberals who look ahead to the televised debate with Gordon Campbell.

He has baggage as well. He’s a newcomer and seen by many NDPers as an opportunist – which he is of course but then so are all politicians. He got into some serious difficulties when he considerably exaggerated his curriculum vitae to include Martin Luther King and horrendous atrocities he was supposed to have witnessed as a child in Kenya. He also looks to some NDPers as a man who fought the NDP which far too much vigor in the past to be considered for their leadership today.

Finally, there’s Ujjal Dosanjh. Perhaps wrongly, he’s seen as the cabinet minister who had the least direct involvement in some of the NDP fiscal debacles. He is also seen as a thoroughly decent person whose ethnicity is a plus not a handicap. It’s no handicap with the left and would be seen as a plus by Liberals and is only a negative to those who wouldn’t vote NDP anyway. He will be seen by delegates as the man who can do the best for them in the next election and, as we learned from the Socred convention way back in 1986, that is a powerful weapon for any leadership candidate. His handling of the Premier’s case and other matters of political morality leave some lingering doubts but I have him as 5/2 to win it all.

The difficult part of assessing NDP leadership conventions is that it’s hard to gauge the importance of the bloc labour vote. How many actual votes can Ken Georgetti and Jim Sinclair swing behind Joy McPhail?

At the end of the day, however, I think the convention will consider who will do best for them at the ballot box and vote accordingly. At this point, given that criterion, it’s hard to see anyone beating Ujjal Dosanjh.