The Liberals unexpectedly won the provincial election in British Columbia on Tuesday surprising many people, who thought the New Democratic Party (NDP) would win.
The Liberals and the NDP are two of Canada’s biggest political parties.
The Liberals were already in power in B.C.; after this election, they will stay in power.
Being “in power” in this case means they are responsible for making many of the important decisions involving laws and money in the province. It also means that their leader is the Premier of the province.
Many people—including political experts—thought the New Democratic Party would win the election. Not only did the Liberals win, but they won a “majority government.” That means they have more seats in the legislature than all of the other parties combined.
Election results
Liberals – 50 seats
NDP – 33 seats
Green Party – 1 seat
Independent – 1 seat
Conservative Party – 0 seats
Part of the reason why some people thought the NDP would win was because polls seemed to show that they had the most support.
Before many elections, people are asked who they will probably vote for; it’s called a “poll.” Polls help to predict who will win an election.
Polls taken in the last few months in B.C. asked people in that province which party (the Liberals, NDP, Conservatives or Green) they wanted to be in power. The most popular choice was the NDP.
Even though they are good for making guesses about who will win an election, polls can be wrong. For one thing, pollsters don’t ask everyone what they think – only certain groups of people – and, people can change their minds about who they will vote for.
The final vote on the actual election day is the only one that counts.
Christy Clark is the leader of the Liberals in B.C. She was the Premier of the province before the election and now will remain as Premier.
On Tuesday she made a happy speech in front of her supporters after the votes were counted.
In her speech, she said something funny. She said, “Well, that was easy!”
Everyone in the audience laughed, because it had been anything but easy for the Liberals to win the election.
In an interesting twist, while Clark led her Liberal party to victory, she didn’t win in her own riding of Vancouver-Point Grey. It’s the first time since 1924 that someone has become Premier without themselves having a “seat” in the legislature.
Clark will likely decide to try to win a place in the legislature in a future “by-election.” (A by-election is a special election that is held between regularly scheduled elections.)
CURRICULUM CONNECTIONS
By Jonathan Tilly & Paul McGoey
Writing/Discussion Prompt
Christy Clark proved many experts wrong by winning this recent election. Has there been a time in your life that you won something shen not many people believed you had a chance? Name a few of the characteristics someone needs to have in order to do this. How could these qualities help a leader?
Reading Prompt: Reading Unfamiliar Words
Stories about politics, like this one about an election, can be quite complicated. There are often many terms that are difficult to understand. Sometimes it’s possible to understand the terms from the context of the article. Other times, it’s helpful to look up their meaning.
How did you ensure that you understood the following terms?
party, riding, votes, legislature, by-election, victory, election, Premier, poll
Primary & Junior
Predict the meaning of and rapidly solve unfamiliar words using different types of cues (OME, Reading: 3.2).
Grammar Feature: Drop the “E” when adding “ing”
There are many helpful rules out there for spelling tricky words. But one of the all time best is, when adding “ing” to a word that ends with an “e,” drop the final “e”. Here are few examples,
guide + ing = guiding
smile + ing = smiling
dance + ing = dancing
ease + ing = easing
Find all the words in today’s article this rule and underline them.
