Minor Party Round-up

We hear about the Liberals, NDP, Conservatives and even the Greens, what is going on with the other parties in BC?  There are 22 more political parties in BC.  In 2009 11 of these parties ran a total of 50 candidates.

I like to see what the wing-nuts, fanatical, and quixotic are doing in BC politics, I last did this round up in December of last year, there have been a few changes since then.   A couple parties have changed their names and two have de-register (Democratic Reform BC and Nation Alliance Party)

I have no idea why the Advocational International Democractic Party of BC or the BC Patriot Party exist, but they seem to have a lot of money.  I wish some journalist would track down Advocational International Democractic Party leader Michael Yawney and BC Patriot Party leader Lillian Stokes and ask them what their parties are about and why they have so much money.  Both parties have to run at least two candidates in this election or they are deregistered 

Wilf Hanni continues to soldier on with his latest political party, the Christian Heritage Party of BC which was created by merging his BC Heritage Party with the Christian Heritage Party of Canada.  CHP-BC does not seem to be very active.  I also can not see a lot cross over on the federal party site.  This is his fourth or fifth party that he has been leader of depending on how you count the change of the BC Heritage Party into CHP-BC.

Victoria lawyer Doug Christie continues with his Western Canada Concept but not very hard.  He has to run at least two candidates in 2013 or the party will be deregistered

The BC Party, Social Credit, Reform BC all seem to be comatose and on artificial life support.  I assume the main reason they have not been de-registered is that people involved think the names have value and want to control the name.  This has been done in Saskatchewan with the PC party.  If Social Credit and the BC Party do not run any candidates in this election they will be deregistered.

Several other parties are registered but seem to be completely dormant such as Your Political Party of BC and the Work Less Party which seems to have had their web url hijacked.

We have a bunch of small parties that all seem to be roughly in the realm of the system has to be changed to empower the people to rule.
Refederation BC - they had a bit of steam going into the 2009 election but their leader at the time, Mike Summers, has since left the party, joined the NDP, left the NDP and now intends to run as an indepedent in the next election.  The party is without a leader after Ingrid Voight resigned the position.  The party is creating a new website.

BC First has been sort of getting going for several years now.  It seems to made of anti-Hanni dissidents from the BC Conservatives and some of the right side of the anti-HST campaign.  After morphing through a series of different positions on issues, the party now seems to be focusing on the idea of all their MLAs would be independents.

The Individual Rights Party of BC -  the best way I could describe them would be as Tea Party North Lite. They have one follower on Twitter and sent out a single tweet.   The leader is Mischa Popoff who has written a book called "Is it Organic?".

One weird policy is the following:

Liberty
The government of a free people allows its citizens to own military grade weapons (after training).
or their take on climate change

Climate
We do not believe in Anthropogenic Global Warming and do not support carbon taxes or carbon trading. We do support fossil fuel electricity generation. (my emphasis)
or their islamophobic policy

Islam
We believe Islam should be reclassified as a political movement since it wants to change Canadian law.
I assume they have less than no knowledge of the law, constitution or religion.

The New Wave Party -  They seem to want all the MLAs to be independents - why they are not part of BC First is one question I would have for the party.

Unparty: The Consensus-Building Party - it seems to have been the People's Senate and recently changed the name.  Sort of sounds like they want to do the same thing as BC First and the New Wave Party.  They have 8 followers on Twitter and sent out 7 tweets.

BC Marijuana Party - they have no active website though the issue has been getting more press lately because of the UBCM vote.   For the record, I do not support decriminalization, I support full and complete legalization.  They also have to run at least two candidates otherwise they will lose their registered status

BC Libertarian Party - they managed a couple of candidates in the by-elections but I saw little public info.  The party has no social media presence.

The Platinum Party - take a look at their website and you tell me what they want, I think it is some sort of anti-government thing with monetary policy connected to it, maybe.  They have a leader based out of Victoria it would seem, Espavo Sozo

From their website:

Has the Government of British Columbia gone through the procedures necessary to maintain a legitimate position of authority over the current commercial world within their jurisdiction?

Does the Government of British Columbia ensure that their employees have the essential authorization documents:
1. Sworn and signed their oath
2. Deposited a security, money, property, or bond with or without securities
3. Are covered by a lawful liability insurance carrier

Without the above no agent can lawfully claim to perform the duties they have been empowered with.


Progressive Nationalists formerly Bloc BC - Brian Taylor is their leader, I think this is the mayor of Grand Forks and first leader of the BC Marijuana party

The Sex Party is actively recruiting candidates for the next election.  They only ran three candidates in 2005 and 2009 and placed at the very back of almost all the parties in the last election.

I have no idea what the Helping Hand Party is about though I recognize the name of the leader, Alan Saldanha, as a onetime federal Green Party candidate that was dumped by the party after a seriously dumb comment on Facebook.

We have a handful of parties on the far left of the spectrum such as the Communist Party of BC, which has been quiet since Campbell resigned.  There is also the People's Front though I have no idea what they want because they do not have it online anywhere I can find.