While BC NDP’s Randene Neill handily won Powell River-Sunshine Coast during the provincial election Oct. 19, hauling in 49.4 per cent of the vote, the students of the riding preferred a different candidate.
Had students had their way, they would have elected BC Conservative Chris Moore to represent them in Victoria.
CIVIX’s Student Vote BC 2024, in collaboration with Elections BC and the federal government, ran mock votes for elementary and high schools across the province ahead of the provincial election, with more than 1,000 schools participating. In the Powell River-Sunshine Coast riding, 18 schools submitted ballots, including nine from the Southern Sunshine Coast.
Moore won 34.17 per cent of the riding-wide student vote, with 639 ballots cast in his favour. In another upset, BC Green Party’s Chris Hergesheimer came in second, with 30.53 per cent of the vote (571 ballots) and Neill came in a close third, with 29.73 per cent of the vote (556 ballots). Like in the election, Independent Greg Reid came in fourth, receiving 5.56 per cent of the vote (104 ballots).
Isolating the Southern Sunshine Coast schools that submitted results for the student vote (Chatelech and Elphinstone Secondary Schools; Halfmoon Bay, Davis Bay, Kinnikinnick, Langdale and West Sechelt Elementary Schools; Pender Harbour Elementary-Secondary School and SPIDER Elementary/Sunshine Coast Online K-6), Moore still came in first place (374 votes), but Hergesheimer was hot at his heels with 362. Neill lagged behind with 291 votes while Reid received 57.
Provincewide, students narrowly elected the BC NDP, with 44 seats and 36.7 per cent of the popular vote, with the BC Conservatives winning 40 seats and 36.2 per cent of the popular vote. The BC Greens won nine seats and 19.2 per cent of the popular vote.
See more detail and results at studentvote.ca/results/bc2024.
