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A group of five former B.C. Conservative MLAs are banding together to create a new provincial political party under the leadership of Peter Milobar and Ian Paton.
MLAs Rosalyn Bird, Bruce Banman and Áʼa:líya Warbus, who have all left the Conservatives in recent weeks, announced they joined the new party Friday morning.
The news follows a series of nine departures from the B.C. Conservative caucus.
In a news release Friday morning, the MLAs of the currently nameless party said they want to give a “stable, serious alternative to the NDP.”
Milobar, acting as interim party leader, told CBC’s The Early Edition that the party will be focused on addressing the daily concerns of British Columbians, including affordability, property rights, natural resource development and health care “in a way that is less 100 per cent tied to ideology.”
“Ultimately, I want us to defeat the NDP and be government,” Milobar said.
Milobar left the Conservative caucus on Aug. 14, saying his values didn’t align with its new leader, and Paton followed soon after.
The two announced their intentions to form a new political party on Aug. 24.
Milobar will sit as interim leader of the party until the caucus elects a permanent one. The party plans to hold an internal leadership vote before Oct. 5 when the legislature returns.
With five seats, the party intends to sit with official third-party status.
B.C. Conservatives in turmoil
Nine Conservative MLAs have quit the caucus since Kerry-Lynne Findlay was elected party leader in May.
Findlay has made moves signalling a shift to the right since her election, particularly in making controversial staffing decisions.
Many of the MLAs leaving the caucus have expressed concerns about Findlay’s leadership.
The Conservatives have also seen key founding staffers leave in the last month, including its executive director and president.
Findlay said in a statement on Thursday that she takes the trust of Conservative members seriously and she intends to strengthen her team.
“I was elected to lead this party, and I intend to lead it with determination, with humility and with the experience to know that strong leaders listen, learn and make changes when changes are needed,” she said.
She added she will focus on emergency room closures, crime and drugs, and the cost of living.
Milobar unsuccessfully ran against Findlay in the leadership contest in May.
His new party is not the first attempt to present an alternative option to taking on the NDP.
Earlier this year, former B.C. Liberal MLAs started CentreBC, a party hoping to avoid the “divisive downward spiral of extreme politics.”
The party does not have any sitting MLAs in the legislature, but it is planning to run a candidate in an upcoming byelection.
There’s also OneBC, which courts social conservatives. MLA Dallas Brodie co-founded the party in June last year, after she was ousted from the Conservatives by then-leader John Rustad.
OneBC lost official party status in December, when Brodie and co-founder Tara Armstrong parted ways. A party needs two MLAs to receive official party status, so Brodie and Armstrong sit as Independents.
Milobar said he’s not concerned his new party will split the vote on the right, though.
He referred to the “exodus of MLAs” in the Conservative caucus in recent weeks and called it “chaos.”
“This is about us and trying to recalibrate and give people a legitimate voting option that they can see themselves voting and MLAs can feel proud to be a part of.”
