The caucus chair for the B.C. United party is defecting to the B.C. Conservatives, adding to the woes of the province’s official Opposition.
Lorne Doerkson, who represents Cariboo-Chilcotin, and B.C. Conservative Leader John Rustad announced the move on Friday afternoon. It increases the party’s numbers in the legislature to three.
The move comes after talks between the two right-of-centre parties broke down amid failure to settle on a deal to avoid vote splitting in the fall provincial election.
Doerkson says in a statement that he made the move because the election set for October is “simply too consequential” and his constituents want to see a Conservative government.
He says the B.C. Conservatives are the only party capable of defeating the current NDP government.
Doerkson was first elected in 2020 and has served as B.C. United’s shadow ministers for water, land and resource stewardship and rural development, and for emergency management and climate readiness.
Both Rustad and fellow Conservative Bruce Banman were previously members of B.C. United under the party’s former name, the B.C. Liberals.