Christy Clark doles out unsolicited post-election advice to federal leaders

With the federal election now over and the Liberals returning to power (albeit with a minority this time) under Justin Trudeau, one former politician is offering seemingly unsolicited post-election advice to each of the federal party leaders.

On Tuesday, former BC Liberal Party leader Christy Clark – who served as BC’s Premier from 2011 to 2017 – offered a series of tips via Twitter to Trudeau, NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh, Conservative Party Leader Andrew Scheer, and Green Party Leader Elizabeth May.

She began each of tweets with “Lessons from the elxn for party leaders,” and then addressed all four leaders directly, in four separate posts.

Lessons from the elxn for party leaders: 1. @ElizabethMay You ran on the issue of the century, and you came a distant 4th. Your party is still way too fringy to be taken seriously. It’s time to come up with a platform that shows you can actually govern.

— Christy Clark (@christyclarkbc) October 23, 2019

Lessons from the elxn for party leaders
2. @theJagmeetSingh Working people (aka the people you need to win) care about getting pipelines and infrastructure built. If you look to much like the Greens, you’re going nowhere.

— Christy Clark (@christyclarkbc) October 23, 2019

Lessons from the elxn for the party leaders 3. @AndrewScheer Moving right on social issues and ignoring climate change are bad strategies. JTs Liberals have moved heavily left and abandoned the centre/centre-right. Take that space over. Cdns want sensible, moderate govt again.

— Christy Clark (@christyclarkbc) October 23, 2019

Lessons from the elxn for party leaders 4. @JustinTrudeau Yes, your majority got chewed up by Bloc/NDP/Greens. But don’t take that as proof that you didn’t move far enough to the left. Go back to the centre – that’s where the majority of Cdn voters still are.

— Christy Clark (@christyclarkbc) October 23, 2019

• See also
  • BC’s voter turnout was lower than the national rate
  • Trudeau says Canadians rejected “division and negativity” in victory speech
  • All the elected MPs in every Metro Vancouver riding

Clark resigned as leader of the BC Liberals following the 2017 provincial election.

In that election, the BC Liberals won 43 seats, the BC NDP 41, and the BC Greens three.

In the aftermath, the BC Greens negotiated with both the BC Liberals and the BC NDP to see if they could work with a party to support a minority government.

Ultimately, the BC Greens agreed to support a BC NDP minority government with John Horgan.

Meanwhile, Clark came under pressure to step down, after the final BC Election count confirmed no party had won the election and after she failed to pass a Throne Speech through the legislature.

This paved the way for a leadership race within the Liberal party, which resulted in Andrew Wilkinson being chosen to fill Clark’s position.

Following her exit from politics, Clark joined Bennett Jones LLP as a Senior Advisor in the firm’s Vancouver office. She was appointed to the board of Shaw Communications, as well.

She also a semi-frequent guest on political talk shows in Canada.