The party coffers
Money makes the political world go 'round
“I don’t know when David Eby will call this year’s election.”
That was the opening line of an email from BC United, sent on May 15th. It is almost explicitly false — the election will be on October 19th. There are laws about this. Laws that BC United (when they were the BC Liberals) passed in the first place.
As you might imagine, this email was not intended to educate their mailing list about the structure and nuances of fixed election dates. It was meant to put pressure on them to make a donation.
Setting aside the disingenuous nature of the opening bit, the rest of the email is a perfectly normal fundraising email, the kind of which many of you will be receiving in increasing number over the next few months. The ask was simple: make a contribution today and we can reach more undecided voters and bring them into the fold. It ends off with a link to donate and to their “Donor Respect Guarantee”, which is something I think is actually pretty clever.
Money is one of the most significant factors in election campaigns. Often (but not always) the winning party is the one with the most money. There are different takes on why this is, ranging from being able to “buy” an election by pouring money into an otherwise unwinnable riding, to money flowing in being a reflection of growing support and momentum.
After the 2017 election, the rules in BC changed around election fundraising. Instead of the “wild west”, where basically anyone from anywhere could donate any amount to any party, strict limits were put on how much an individual can donate to a single party and corporate, union, and out-of-province donations were banned entirely. Other rules were added to third-party fundraising and campaign spending limits, to avoid a US-style PAC system where the money just flows elsewhere but still ends up in the same place.
These rules were in place for the 2020 election, but being the COVID-snap election, it was hard to say exactly how much of an impact they made versus the overall massive societal changes and pressures that were happening at the time.
Money isn’t everything. In 2017 the BC Liberals had a huge financial advantage, and still fell short of the majority they needed to hold on to power. A party can outspend their opponent 2-to-1 and be entirely swept out of office. But there is no doubt having ample resources makes everything to do with campaigning easier.
If a party is smart, they allocate their resources carefully and invest in long-term planning, training, staff, facilities, and whatever else they need to make a breakthrough. Having a capable, experienced staff that aren’t looking over their shoulder at a round of layoffs if fundraising staggers, and can feed/house themselves on their salary, is essential to the long-term success of an organization.
Which brings me to the state of the parties in preparation for the 2024 election.
Since the start of 2021 until the end of March, 2024:
NDP raised $13,274,208
Liberals/United raised $8,940,785
Greens raised $3,584,431
Conservatives raised $964,469, mostly in the last two quarters.
For United, their fundraising was bordering around the same amount as the Greens up until their leadership race. Despite their flagging poll numbers after their rebrand, their fundraising has actually improved since then, finally bringing them closer to the governing NDP than the third party.
While they're far behind in terms of actual dollars, the Greens have perhaps the most reliable fundraising, remaining fairly steady and predictable each quarter. For a party with only two seats, they hold their own in the fundraising race fairly well, competing with United (when they were BC Liberals) for second place for most of 2021 and 2022. With that kind of consistency, it's much easier to plan a campaign budget.
They have now been surpassed by the upstart Conservatives, who went from the mid-five-digits for most of the last few years to almost $300,000 in the final quarter of 2023 and just shy of $400,000 in the first quarter of this year. They are also the only party to have a better Q1 than Q4 (in political fundraising, Q1 is usually the worst in a calendar year and Q4 is usually the best, notwithstanding election years.) The challenge with the BC Conservatives is that this money is new, which means they haven’t had time to invest that over the long-term and build a capable, trained team with the expensive database/canvassing structures that make things run smoothly. In absence of that infrastructure, it’s likely most of that money will be put into their communications apparatuses, so expect to see a lot of Facebook ads in the coming months.
The BCNDP, meanwhile, run the table on political fundraising, having brought in almost half of every dollar raised in the last three years. In every single quarter they have exceeded their opponents, and, until the second quarter of 2022, by more than all of them combined. Assuming they put some away for the coming election, they should be able to run circles around the others in terms of staff, advertising and campaign infrastructure.
However, with a significant advantage comes complacency. The Greens and Conservatives will have to carefully manage their budgets to make the most of their limited dollars, which means putting thought and consideration into their decisions. You can’t just spend on whatever you want when one bad choice might mean you can no longer fund a campaign in a winnable seat. Going back to United’s ‘Donor Respect Guarantee’, donors want to know that their money is being used effectively.
If someone puts their money towards a party it is an investment. They see something they like, and are willing to put money on the line to support that. Parties and politicians know that behind every dollar they spend is a donor who wants them to win. If that money isn’t spent well, or that donor loses faith in the party, it won’t be there next time.
And of course, no matter how much money you have, nothing is truly certain. As the BC Liberals showed in 2017, even having almost double the bank account of your rival won’t save you if the public has decided it’s time to go.