There are moments in B.C. politics that have the potential to upend everything.

Such was the case Saturday, when the results of the BC Conservative leadership race were announced. In a moment, the political playing field was reset. Again.

Either frontrunner, Kerry-Lynne Findlay or Caroline Elliott, was shaping up to be a polarizing choice for members. But the closeness of the results highlighted a deeply divided BC Conservative base.

Findlay won on the fourth and final ballot with just 51 per cent of the vote. The party was split right down the middle on its future direction.

Half wanted the young, untested, academic new-age Conservative in Elliott, even with her history as a BC Liberal. The other half preferred a veteran, hard-right, traditional federal Conservative cabinet minister and lawyer, even with a history of controversial comments by herself and her husband.

The difference between the two was just 182.02 points out of 9,211.

Stitching together that divide will take serious work by Findlay.

The traditional route in politics is to invite your rival to take a top position on your team, perhaps even as your second-in-command. That sends a signal to members who didn’t support you that they still have a senior voice at the table to influence the future of the party.

But based on how bitter and personal this race was, a partnership between Findlay and Elliott seems unlikely.

In the absence of magnanimity, humility has been used by political leaders in the past. Instead of publicly declaring ultimate victory, a more conciliatory tone that promises to listen and learn from the strong views of the thousands of party members who didn’t support you can suffice.

That may still be coming. But it wasn’t quite on display the morning after the vote, when most of the caucus gathered behind Findlay in Vancouver on Sunday.

“Well, are you staying?” Findlay asked them, according to a CBC News report.

“Yeah!” shouted the MLAs.

The forced performance was hardly reassuring.

Caucus management of any party is a delicate task, especially in opposition when there are no powerful cabinet roles to offer in exchange for loyalty.

It is, however, still possible. Interim leader Trevor Halford is the most recent example. His open-door policy as leader, and attempt to hear all perspectives from MLAs, kept caucus together the last five months.

It will be harder for Findlay. Especially as momentum gathers for a new, centrist party to which MLAs uncomfortable with her leadership could defect.

Already, independent Surrey South MLA Elenore Sturko (who was fired from the Conservatives last September) is publicly musing about the “void” left on the political spectrum by the hard-right turn towards Findlay.

Could that void be filled by MLAs like Sturko willing to jumpstart the nascent CentreBC party from departing leader Karin Kirkpatrick? Could someone even convince Kevin Falcon to let up his control of the defunct BC United party, and with it the old BC Liberal brand?

The mere possibility puts pressure on Findlay to tread carefully.

She may bring back exiled MLAs from the far right, such as Peace River’s Jordan Kealy and Kelowna’s Tara Armstrong. But she could also lose MLAs from the centre, such as Kamloops’ Peter Milobar (whom Findlay has declared in a conflict of interest for having an Indigenous wife) and Chilliwack’s Á’a:líya Warbus (a leader in the Indigenous community).

That’s assuming, of course, that Findlay cares about holding together the current version of the BC Conservative coalition.

She may prefer, instead, to lean into her long-held vision for the party as a populist far-right freedom movement.

So many choices for the new leader. And many of them critical. Whether Findlay courts or ostracizes the 49 per cent of the party that didn’t support her will reshape the rest of the province’s political dynamic.

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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