Once his rival for leadership, Juan de Fuca MLA John Horgan said he’s pleased to see his longtime friend Adrian Dix take the party’s top spot. Horgan was eliminated in the second round of voting.
“Obviously I would have preferred to win, but I have no regrets,” said Horgan, noting he may have done better if he’d started his campaign earlier to sign up more members or if he had more time to build the momentum he was gaining from his visits to all corners of the province.
Dix, the high-profile Vancouver-Kingsway MLA, won the NDP leadership Sunday after three rounds of voting.
Horgan believes the leadership race helped bring the party together through it’s positive messages. He was fond of calling the leadership debates “NDP love-ins,” where the candidates stressed their unity, finding little to disagree on.
With the race behind them, Horgan said it’s time for the party to “fold together to take on the Liberals.”
“Unity is a collective responsibility. We need this whole party working together,” he said. “This (leadership race) reinvigorated the NDP. It got us talking about issues. We’re stronger from it.”
Horgan is looking forward to getting back to his Langford office and working in the constituency. He said he’s deeply concerned about the tanker truck spilling gasoline into Goldstream River.
“We need to look into how prepared we were to respond to an emergency like that,” he said. “That’s what I’ll be doing as soon as I get back.”
Dix also beat out Dana Larsen and Port Coquitlam MLA Mike Farnworth, a more moderate candidate who was believed from polls to be the front-runner. Farnworth had 48 per cent of the vote in the final round.
Marijuana activist Dana Larsen was dropped from the ballot after the first round with 531 supporters.
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