February 24th

B.C. Liberals chop 6,000 names from membership list

Just days before BC Liberals choose their next leader, the party has shed 6,000 names from its membership list in response to challenges from the four candidates’ camps about dubious signups.

That’s after a race to sign up new, voting-eligible members by the leadership candidates that swelled the party’s membership list by 60,000 in a matter of weeks.

On Saturday, roughly 90,000 party members will be voting to choose the party’s new leader, and British Columbia’s next premier. The majority of the invalidated memberships come from the newcomers to the party.

During the signup drive, the party was found to have accepted membership applications from a cat who belongs to a senior campaign organizer, and an entire junior hockey team.

Other concerns included photocopied membership applications and a restaurant that offered an incentive program for signups.

While some candidates dismissed the signups as the product of exuberant volunteers, candidate George Abbott demanded the party bring in outside scrutiny to root out fraud. The party brass did hire an auditor, but it is unlikely the current cleanup of the lists will entirely quell concerns about the party’s voting list.

Representatives for the four leadership contenders were meeting Tuesday evening to go over the changes to the list. Well over 10,000 memberships have been challenged, and some insiders say they still harbour doubts about the accuracy of the current membership rolls.

“The issue is the lack of transparency,” said one senior campaign worker. While the campaigns can track who is eligible to vote, it is more difficult to find out who has been struck from the list, and why. “There may still be more that could be challenged.”

Others, however, said the cull of 6,000 memberships shows the party has taken their concerns seriously. “The party has done a pretty rigorous audit and obviously found inconsistencies,” said a source from another camp. “People get a little exuberant.”

As well, some legitimate party members found they were removed from the list and are now appealing to be allowed to vote.

At one point, Kristy Wawryk found herself removed from the list along with her cat Olympia. Ms. Wawryk, a senior volunteer for candidate Christy Clark, is a longtime party member and a riding association president. Her membership was eliminated during the furor over what the Clark team described as a prank. A campaign insider says Ms. Wawryk has since had her voting privileges restored – but Olympia is still off the list.

Campaign insiders said Tuesday the party has granted the candidates access to the Intelivote Systems database that is being used to conduct the vote on Feb. 26. That database is critical to the campaigns because it will allow them to direct their appeals and track who has voted throughout the day.

BC Liberals with a party-issued personal identification number will be able to vote by telephone or over the Internet. The PINs are already in the mail and are expected to arrive on Wednesday or Thursday. There is no requirement to register or appear in person, leading Mr. Abbott and others to raise concerns about how the party is verifying the identity of those new members.

My thoughts: There needs to be a tightening of party membership rules. It doesn’t seem right that a party can control their membership without a mandatory external auditor. On a lighter note, what went through the senior volunteer’s mind to think that adding her cat to the list would be of a little consequence to the party she spends so much energy supporting?