EDITORIAL – Serious reform of B.C.’s recall legislation is badly needed

An editorial by Mel Rothenburger.

THE RECALL PETITION against Vancouver-Quilchena MLA Dallas Brodie has failed (as announced Monday, July 20, 2026), and while the result is bound to bring varying reactions, it should be no surprise.

I say that based on the recall system, not on anything to do with Brodie.

Brodie, who visited Kamloops not long ago for a OneBC public rally, is a controversial figure to say the least. She’s the one who gets in trouble for comments on the reconciliation issue, especially residential schools. While she often speaks the truth when she confines herself to basic facts, she also often does so in an unpleasant manner.

The campaign to recall her was based on that as well as controversies at the party level. To succeed, canvassers would have had to collect the signatures of 40 per cent of those who were registered to vote on the day she was elected. That’s 15,232 names. It was a tall order, too tall — only 3,663 signatures were gathered.

Recall attempts have never succeed in B.C., though there have been 31 of them since the legislation came into effect in 1995. That included an effort to unseat then-Kamloops North Thompson MLA Terry Lake in 2011. Almost 11,000 signatures were collected, but 16,000 were needed.

The ability to recall an MLA is an important democratic exercise (though it doesn’t exist for City councils, but that’s a topic for another day). The rationale for such a daunting threshold is the belief that making it too low would encourage recall campaigns based on politics rather than on legitimate concerns about an MLA’s performance. (There are actually no set criteria for attempting recall.)

Now seems a good time to review my own opinion about what should happen to recall legislation to make it more logical and worthwhile.

Requiring 40 per cent of eligible voters is simply ridiculous. A more proper base would be turnout. Set a percentage based on the number of voters who showed up at the ballot box on election day. That would provide a good indication of what the public — those who are reasonably informed at least — wants to see happen.

In the case of Brodie, 22,227 people voted in Vancouver-Quichena. Forty per cent of that is 8,891, so the recall still wouldn’t have succeeded but it would have been a more logical threshold.

But one thing is sure — recall petitions in B.C. will never succeed unless the rules undergo some serious reform.

Mel Rothenburger is a former regular contributor to CFJC-TV and CBC radio, publishes the ArmchairMayor.ca opinion website, writes for the Kamloops Chronicle and is a recipient of the Jack Webster Foundation Lifetime Achievement Award, and was a Webster Foundation Commentator of the Year finalist. He has served as mayor of Kamloops, school board chair and TNRD director, and is a retired daily newspaper editor.  He can be reached at mrothenburger@armchairmayor.ca.