Whoever gets elected the next leader of the BC Conservatives on Saturday will inherit a party largely free of caucus drama—for the first time, perhaps, in its history.

They can thank Trevor Halford, who as interim leader has helped stage a remarkable turnaround of the opposition party during the spring session of the legislature.

The BC Conservatives have now gone five months without public fights, split votes, controversial bills or unauthorized renegade speeches that exploded into crisis management.

That’s no small feat. Especially when you consider the comedy of errors during the dying days of John Rustad’s leadership, involving things like firings, resignations and mandatory cell phone searches for MLAs.

You could be forgiven for having initially bet against Halford’s success.

The MLA for Surrey-White Rock was thrust into the role after the caucus and party mutinied to declare Rustad “professionally incapacitated” last December. It was messy. At one point, Rustad refused to give up his leadership seat in the house even though the party had already declared Halford in charge and put his photo on the website.

Many Conservatives initially recoiled at the choice, given Halford’s history as a BC United MLA who had only begrudgingly been allowed to run as a Conservative in 2024.

Still, Halford set out to prove them wrong.

He hired strategist Allie Blades as his chief of staff, and she made quick work retraining the caucus on basic roles, setting up procedures manuals and restructuring staff into a leaner crew that can absorb whatever new people the next leader brings on board without blowing the budget.

For the first time, MLAs were whipped on how to vote and held to account by Prince George-Valemount MLA Rosalyn Bird if they tried to break party lines on fringe issues brought up by OneBC or other independents. No one has broken ranks since (a recent vote on the K’omoks treaty was declared a free vote that did see some Conservatives vote in different ways).

I’m told there have still been fiery internal caucus meetings, with yelling and tears. But they never leaked publicly. And MLAs I’ve spoken to say Halford showed patience in taking the time to listen to everyone’s perspectives (something Rustad did not do), which helped diffuse strong feelings.

He also had an open-door policy as leader. That idea drew upon Halford’s two decades of experience as a political staffer in which he watched some leaders, like Kevin Falcon and Rustad, close themselves off from caucus and become inaccessible to MLAs.

It helped, perhaps, that the Conservative caucus appears to be finally coalescing into a bit more of a team.

When some MLAs expressed interest this week in attending a rally at the legislature denying any graves or harm at the former Kamloops residential school, they eventually chose not to out of respect to the harm it would cause Kamloops-North Thompson MLA Ward Stamer in his riding. They behaved more like an actual party, and less like a ragtag group of selfish free-speech radicals.

It also helped that Halford has long been one of the party’s sharpest critics and best performers in the house. He led by example in every question period. The Conservatives dug up more issues, passed more bills and generated more hits on government in five months than they did in a year under Rustad.

Halford wrapped up his job at the legislature on Thursday without any tributes. The only public acknowledgement came, ironically, from Premier David Eby, who thanked him for the sacrifice of fulfilling a tough job at a tough time.

Still, there’s no denying the stable position the Conservatives are in now compared to last year. The party’s next leader has a clear runway to try and launch a government-in-waiting. For that, they can credit Halford.

Rob Shaw has spent more than 18 years covering B.C. politics, now reporting for CHEK News and writing for BIV. He hosts the weekly show Political Capital and has a NEW daily podcast, Political Capital Daily.

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