- Incumbent: Rob Fleming (NDP | 2005)
- Candidates:
- NDP: Nina Krieger
- Conservative: Tim Taylor
- Green: Christina Winter
- Independent: Robert Crooks
- Results:
- NDP – 59%
- Green – 28%
- Liberal – 11%
- Description:
- Taking in northern neighbourhoods of the City of Victoria and the urban core of the District of Saanich, Victoria-Swan Lake is one of those cozy, left-leaning inner suburban ridings that is staunchly NDP. With the Dippers and Greens combining for nearly 90% of the vote in 2020, it may well be the most left-wing riding in BC, only rivalled by the newly rechristened Vancouver-Strathcona.
- Unlike New Westminster or East Vancouver though, the riding’s left-wing streak isn’t a result of income. In fact, it’s more well-off than Beacon Hill! Victoria’s NDP habit began in 1975, where even as they went down to defeat provincewide, they had calmed fears here about them being socialist hordes clawing at the gates. Bill Bennett’s policy of austerity and strikebreaking didn’t endear the right to the public servants living in the area either. Since then, the NDP has dominated for half a century barring a brief four year blip after Campbell’s 2001 landslide.
- The Greens are hoping to end that streak. They’ve identified the South Island as the NDP’s weak underbelly, and are hoping to rip it wide open while Eby is busy fending off Conservative advances into Metro Vancouver. They even recruited their candidate, former constituency assistant Christina Winter all the way back in 2023.
- Defending the NDP’s hold is, for the first time in almost two decades, not Rob Fleming. The New Democrats have recruited the Executive Director of the Vancouver Holocaust Education Centre Nina Krieger to join their slate to mend bridges with the province’s Jewish community after Selina Robinson was pushed out of cabinet. While she’s only recently moved to Victoria, Fleming has lent her heavy support from the local NDP machine here.
- With most of the Greens’ resources directed to Sonia Furstenau’s bid to unseat Grace Lore south of Bay Street, Winter’s run here is moreso to lay the groundwork for a future offensive from Beacon Hill across Greater Victoria. The real problem is where to even start, as the NDP performs well across the whole riding. If the Greens want to build pockets of support though, they should focus on Oaklands and Quadra Village, which are both inner suburbs with a green tinge to them in Victoria. Saanich is a bit sleepier for now, but future residents moving into new commercial development at the core could be open to their pitch.
- While the riding is undoubtedly lefty and well-educated, it has more of a classical Dipper feel to it rather than the idiosyncratic Green coalition of the old environmentalists and young countercultural hipsters. While Krieger will have a cakewalk against Conservative realtor Tim Taylor, this fight is moreso about whether or not she can blunt further advances from the Greens as they try to put on their best ever showing.
Hugh Chan is a second year student at UBC studying International Relations and Data Science. You can find more coverage of the 2024 BC election as well as politics across East Asia and the Anglosphere at https://x.com/shxnhugh.
