3 Ridings that might surprise people in BC

Victoria

• Christopher Causton - Liberal
• Jared Giesbrecht - Green
• Patrick Hunt - Conservative
• Denise Savoie - NDP

This riding has been around since 1925.   Other than 2004 and 2006, the right wing has either won this riding or come second in every election since 1925.  In 1988, 1993 and 1997 the combined vote of Reform and PC was equal to the winning candidates.

David Anderson of the Liberals won in four elections but only broke 40% once.   He managed to win because in three of the elections this was close to a three way race.

Denise Savoie won in 2006 and 2008 for the NDP and her last win was the highest percentage of the vote for a candidate winning in Victoria since 1984.

The next election will be an interesting one because the candidates that will be running.   The Liberals have nominated Oak Bay mayor Chris Causton.   He will be a strong and popular candidate.  I see him gaining back a lot of the ground the Liberals lost in 2008.   30% is a realistic percentage of the vote for him.  He will pick up Green and NDP support.

The Conservatives have Patrick Hunt running, a former Nova Scotia MLA, he also came second in 1993 as the Reform candidate.   The Conservatives have the money in the bank and the volunteers ready.  I can not see him losing support from 2008 and seeing him rising to 30% of the vote.

I see Denise Savoie winning with 35% of the vote this time around.   She will lose a lot of support to Chris Causton.  This also means the riding is within a realistic range for the Liberals or Conservatives win, much will depend on the national campaign.

Kamloops-Thompson-Cariboo

• Michael Crawford - NDP
• Cathy Mcleod - Conservative - current MP
• Kevin Ortner - Green
• Murray Todd - Liberal

The heart of this riding, Kamloops, voted for the NDP  - Nelson Riis really.  It also elected Liberal Len Marchand in 1968, 72 and 74.  It has a long history of being much more in the centre.   The NDP did not badly here in 2008 and with the complete collapse of the Liberal vote in 2008, this is a two person race.

In a two person race it becomes much more of a battle than it was in the last couple of elections.

Kootenay Columbia

• William Green - Green
• Mark Shmigelsky - NDP
• David Wilks - Conservative
• tba - Liberal

The riding is open and most of the area of the riding is held provincially by the NDP.   The NDP has also won this riding in the past.

As long as Jim Abbott was the MP, the NDP has not put much effort into winning this riding.

This is another area the Liberals collapsed in 2008.   This makes this also a two person race and it is much more likely to be a horse race than people expect