When will we know more about B.C.'s tight provincial election?
Elections B.C. says a final tally will happen from Oct. 26-28
The full results of the 2024 provincial election in B.C. may not be known for another week, as officials tally a number of close races where the B.C. NDP and B.C. Conservatives are in a dead heat.
As of 8 a.m. PT on Sunday, the NDP were leading or elected in 46 seats, the Conservatives in 45 seats and the B.C. Greens were elected in two seats. In the B.C. Legislature, 47 seats are required to form a majority government.
Based on preliminary results, CBC News has not projected the winners of 11 ridings — with the NDP leading in six of those, and the Conservatives in five.
Two of those ridings will be subject to an automatic recount — which happens in any district where the margin of victory is 100 votes or less. Parties can also request a recount in close ridings.
The guaranteed recounts will occur in Juan de Fuca-Malahat, which the NDP is leading by 23 votes, and Surrey City Centre, which the NDP is leading by 96 votes.
The winners of those recounts will be determined during the final counting period between Oct. 26 and 28, according to Elections B.C.
In a statement sent just before 3 p.m. PT Sunday, Elections B.C. said it had finished its initial count, which included out-of-district votes and mail-in ballots sent before the end of advance voting. It said 99.72 per cent of results had been reported by just past midnight Sunday, and that officials had finished the count by later that morning.
However, Elections B.C. said some ballots cannot be tallied until their final count on Oct. 26, "because they require additional integrity checks to ensure the voter was eligible to vote and that they only voted once."
"Ballots counted at final count include mail-in ballots returned after the close of advance voting, and out-of-district ballots cast by voters at non-technology voting places."
Elections B.C. estimated there would be approximately 49,000 such ballots.
Once the amount of mail-in ballots are revealed in each riding, CBC News may be able to project the results for some close ridings before final counting on Oct. 26.
Elections B.C. said "election official availability and weather-related disruptions" delayed some preliminary results, and that there were also delays due to elections officials double-checking ballots as a quality assurance measure.
Echoes of 2017 election
The NDP's Adrian Dix, incumbent health minister and the winner of the Vancouver-Renfrew riding, said that Saturday's election mirrored the 2017 election — which eventually saw the NDP form a minority government through a confidence and supply agreement with the Greens.
The results of that election were not known for a few days afterwards, but Dix cautioned that counting would still take place on Sunday morning.
"This is an extremely close election. The elections in B.C., really all my lifetime, have been four per cent either way — and this was no exception," he told the CBC's Rosemary Barton.
Dix said that the NDP's preliminary popular vote share, at 44.5 per cent, was the third-highest in the party's nearly century-long history.
"When you look at the NDP and the Green votes, there is a significant progressive majority in the province," he said.
"But all of that said, it is very very disappointing of course when you lose such outstanding colleagues."
Parties watching and waiting
Peter Milobar, who won as a Conservative candidate in Kamloops Centre and was previously a longtime B.C. Liberal MLA for the area, said that his party was waiting and watching to see how the results would shake out on Sunday.
"Things could swing so dramatically one way or the other, in terms of is it a minority government, is it a majority," he told CBC News.
Milobar said he had had conversations with Conservative Leader John Rustad after Saturday, but that talks about potentially forming an alliance with the Greens would be had by the leader and not him.
Rustad confirmed to CBC News in an interview Sunday that he was looking forward to having those discussions with the Green Party.
CBC News reached out to the newly elected B.C. Green MLAs and party Leader Sonia Furstenau for an interview Sunday, but they declined requests.
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With files from Rosemary Barton, Marcella Bernardo and Katie DeRosa