Politicians will be heading back to Victoria very soon and the BC Liberals will have a fresh new look.
It will be the first sitting with Andrew Wilkinson as party leader after taking the leadership vote last weekend.
The Liberals believe they are set-up for success with Wilkinson at the helm.
“Andrew is an incredibly hard-working and very intelligent person, he has a great experience with the party and in government as he was a deputy minister and I’m confident he’ll be able to provide the leadership that is necessary for our party,” says Shirley Bond, Prince George-Valemount MLA.
“We have our work cut out for us in order to be an effective opposition in the house and then continue to grow our party as we get ready for the next election.”
Wilkinson was one of the biggest proponents of Northern BC during his campaign to become party leader, something that should serve him well heading into the new role.
“I think he has the heart to understand the issues here, in fact, he’s very concerned about things like proportional representation, sustainable resource development – all of those things matter to us here in the north,” adds Bond.
She says the party has two main goals going forward with its new leader now in check.
“One is to win a by-election with Ben Stewart in Kelowna and then we have to go back to the legislature and continue to be the effective opposition that we were and now it’s up to Andrew in a very short amount of time to coalesce the party, take us into the legislative session and pointing out the priorities for British Columbians that he’s listened to.”
The Vancouver-Quilchena MLA beat out Dianne Watts with 53% of the vote on Saturday.
He was the Minister of Advanced Education from December of 2014 to June of 2017.