British Columbia must wait a few more days to know who forms its next provincial government, but it’s already certain that its next agriculture minister won’t be incumbent Pam Alexis.
Alexis, the minister of agriculture and food for David Eby’s New Democrats since late 2022, was defeated in her constituency of Abbotsford-Mission in Saturday night’s election by Conservative challenger Reann Gasper, by a spread of almost 2,700 votes.
If the initial vote count holds, Eby’s NDP will be in a minority government position with just 46 of 93 seats, while John Rustad’s Conservatives captured 45 and Sonia Furstenau’s Greens won two. (Furstenau also lost her own seat, in the riding of Victoria-Beacon Hill.)
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Elections BC said Sunday it will conduct a final count from Oct. 26 to 28, at which time official recounts will also take place for two ridings (Juan de Fuca-Malahat and Surrey City Centre) where the spread between the top two candidates in the initial count was smaller than 100 votes.
Alexis, a former mayor (2018-2020) for the Fraser Valley city of Mission, was a rookie MLA when she was named to cabinet in 2022, as Eby replaced John Horgan in the premier’s chair.
As ag minister she replaced Saanich South MLA Lana Popham, who’d handled the ag file since the NDP regained government in 2017.
Popham, who was Eby’s incumbent minister for tourism, arts, culture and sport heading into Saturday’s election, held her seat by a spread of almost 4,900 votes over Conservative challenger Adam Kubel.
