Given the (likely) minority government result in British Columbia last week, a number of people have been trying to game out various different scenarios for how this all might happen. Meanwhile, media everywhere are flocking to hear what the Green Party has to say, with their apparent balance of power, while Elizabeth May in Ottawa keep spouting this laundry list of things that apparently 57 percent of British Columbians voted for, despite the fact that there is no actual proof that those voters all voted for those very things, be it electoral reform or stopping the Kinder Morgan pipeline expansion. Nevertheless, when UBC economist Kevin Milligan asked my thoughts, here is what I told him:

My only thoughts at this point are pretty much that it’s curious, and that I’m waiting for the Greens to overplay their hand spectacularly.

— Dale Smith (@journo_dale) May 14, 2017

https://twitter.com/kevinmilligan/status/863821080124735488

Christie Clark is a good retail politician. She’ll find a line that she can sell to the public as reasonable, and go back to them otherwise.

— Dale Smith (@journo_dale) May 14, 2017

That, and creating a list of demands that are both unachievable, or which doesn’t get that they have three seats.

— Dale Smith (@journo_dale) May 14, 2017

That’s certainly the bigger possibility, because Legislature won’t meet until October. Closer to 6 months since election.

— Dale Smith (@journo_dale) May 14, 2017

https://twitter.com/kevinmilligan/status/863822647229952000

https://twitter.com/kevinmilligan/status/863823376627912704

I’m sure everyone will be expecting a Tony nomination by the end of it.

— Dale Smith (@journo_dale) May 14, 2017

I do think the fact that the legislature won’t sit until October is a key factor. BC has always been a bit weird about this, and there has been a lot of wailing and gnashing of teeth from some political scientists over social media that there is a pattern of cancelling the spring session of the BC legislature and few people seem all that bothered about it, while Christy Clark seems to make it sound like it’s such a terrible imposition that they have to bother sitting at all, which is weird and uncool for a democracy.

https://twitter.com/kevinmilligan/status/863822997072732161

There is a burgeoning convention that if it’s been six months, that it’s more likely that the GG or the lieutenant governor will call an election rather than entertain an attempt by the opposition to form government. And what I meant by how leaders perform in the meantime is whether there are any temper tantrums (particularly from the NDP leader, who has been fighting a reputation for being a hothead throughout the campaign), and that will weigh on how the public perceives any kind of government arrangement – we did live through this in Ottawa in 2008, and the fact that Harper mostly kept his cool while Stéphane Dion went apoplectic certainly helped Harper’s case with the general public. As I also mentioned, I have a suspicion that the Greens will try to overplay their hands in trying to get a bigger share of the governing pie, and making a list of demands that may not be saleable to Clark. Of course, the moment that happens, she has ammunition to go back to the voters to say “look at how unreasonable these people are, and they want to destroy the economy, so you need to give me a real majority mandate.” We’ll see if any of this happens, but this is pretty much what I have to say on the matter for now.

Good reads:

• The government is expected to announce the Defence Policy Review report after the NATO meeting this week, and it looks like it’ll mean new spending.
• Chrystia Freeland expects that the Americans will trigger the NAFTA renegotiation period soon, now that they have a Trade Representative in place.
• Amarjeet Sohi pushed back against some of the arguments against the Infrastructure Bank, in particular that the government would assume all risk.
• A bill to enact the long promised “passenger bill of rights” is expected to be tabled this week.
• More extreme weather events and higher disaster relief costs has ministers talking mitigation measures and trying to prevent future floods.
• More reports coming out this week on the state of the RCMP are raising calls that perhaps it’s time for a joint management board instead of a top-down hierarchy.
• The changing nature of Syria’s al-Qaeda affiliate means problems with attempting prosecutions under Canadian law.
• MSF is warning that we may be facing another refugee crisis of migrants fleeing from Central America by way of Mexico.
• Here’s a look at how the Conservative race remains up in the air, despite the fact that Maxime Bernier is out-fundraising everyone else.
• Adam Radwanski figures that potential NDP leadership hopeful Jagmeet Singh will pose a new kind of problem for Justin Trudeau.

Odds and ends:

The Clerk of the Privy Council talks about the need for better project management as a number of major IT projects are in danger of going off the rails.