Newly elected MLA Nicholas Simons said he's honoured and humbled by the responsibility of representing the riding of Powell River-Sunshine Coast.
In an interview following his election-night victory speech, Simons promised he would take every opportunity to reach consensus.
"This is a diverse riding that sometimes has competing interests," Simons said. "Everybody in this constituency has me as an MLA, and I have them as my constituents."
However, Simons left no doubt that he is an NDP partisan.
"I'm disappointed that the Liberals won. I think it's bad for the province," he said. "People are tired of arrogance. We're taught not to be bullies."
In his victory speech to a crowd of cheering supporters at the Sechelt Indian Band (SIB) community hall, Simons said, "We want representation from a person who knows how to listen to everyone, who won't run away when there are difficult decisions to be made."
Simons, a professional social worker and amateur cellist, is the first New Democrat to win this riding in more than 20 years.
Don Lockstead, first elected in 1972, held this riding for the NDP for 14 years until Harold Long won it for the Socreds in 1986. Gordon Wilson was elected twice, as Liberal leader in 1991 and then for his Progressive Democratic Alliance Party in 1996. In 2001, after Wilson crossed the floor of the legislature to join the NDP, he lost his bid for re-election to Long, who had also switched parties to become a Liberal.
In this election, Simons rode a province-wide wave of renewed support for the New Democratic Party, as he won the riding of Powell River-Sunshine Coast by a convincing 3,100-vote margin. The preliminary election results for this riding are 43.4 per cent for Simons, 30.4 per cent for Liberal candidate Maureen Clayton and 25.6 per cent for Green Party leader Adriane Carr.
The strongest NDP support was in Powell River, where citizens voted two to one for Simons over Clayton. On the lower Sunshine Coast, Simons edged Clayton by just 500 votes.
Clayton out-polled Simons in Pender Harbour, Halfmoon Bay, West Sechelt, Sechelt and Langdale. Carr failed to make the election breakthrough she had hoped for, despite maintaining a high profile throughout the campaign and earning compliments for her performance during the leaders' debate.
Carr got only 25 per cent of the vote in her home riding, slightly less than in 2001, and her party dropped to nine per cent of the province-wide vote, down from 12 per cent in 2001.
Carr, who spent most of election night at a Green gathering in North Vancouver, said she's disappointed but recognizes "the will of the voters was to elect Nicholas and the NDP."
"I really saw the voters wanting to send the Liberals a message in this riding, and they did," said Carr.
Carr said the nine per cent vote represents a "solid core" of Green support that she can build on. She plans to stay on as Green Party leader if that is the will of the party membership.
"I love what I do. People are phoning me in droves and saying, please, don't give up," said Carr. "I will go through a leadership review. I think that's really important after an election, especially after an election where our numbers went down."
NDP supporters gathered at the SIB hall on election night were in a celebratory mood as they watched the provincial results on CBC-TV. They booed whenever Gordon Campbell appeared on the screen and applauded wildly when NDP leader Carole James won her seat.
"This is a lot better than 2001," commented one New Democrat as he waited in line at the beer-and-wine bar.
A cheer went up at 9:15 p.m. when the CBC declared Simons the winner based on early poll returns. But with the scrutineers at local polling stations reporting a close race between Simons and Clayton, NDP campaign workers remained doubtful of that result for another hour.
When Simons finally arrived to make his victory speech, he was mobbed by a crush of supporters trying to hug him or shake his hand.
Simons thanked his campaign manager Joanne McNevin, his partner Scott Scobbie and the people of the Sechelt Nation, where he has worked for the past nine years.
"I will do my best to represent each and every person in this community, with strength, with passion," said Simons. The crowd responded with a resounding cheer.
"We're back in the game," shouted one man.
Optimism was running high early in the evening as supporters for Clayton and the Liberal party gathered at Pebbles Restaurant in Sechelt to watch the election returns on Global TV.
But by 9 p.m., reality started to set in, and by 9:15, most of the party faithful knew Clayton would not be victorious. Shortly before 10 p.m., Clayton addressed the crowd and thanked her campaign team and supporters.
"We did our best, we worked hard, and we have nothing to be ashamed of," Clayton said. "I want to give special mention to my campaign manager Chris Koopmans who put his life on hold to run my campaign. We can do it again. I think my responsibility is to help build the Liberal party. It will happen, it will happen again."
Following her address, Clayton talked with Coast Reporter about the campaign and her future with the Liberal party.
"It's difficult to say exactly what the difference was," Clayton said. "I think the NDP were really strong in getting out the vote and they certainly did here in supporting Nicholas. We all worked extremely hard. When you get involved in this you think, what was the key that turned it? We might think about the last four years and how it affected people, particularly in this riding."
As to her future, Clayton admitted it was a bit premature to start thinking about that but did say she will remain active with the Liberal party.
"I believe in the Liberal values and their policies," she said. "I'm going to work very hard to ensure that remains here. Perhaps we need to regroup and rethink what we're doing and have a really exciting riding association. I want to do that and be there for my community. I'm going to look for new challenges."
