{"id":166939,"date":"2025-09-24T21:16:07","date_gmt":"2025-09-24T21:16:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/166939\/"},"modified":"2025-09-24T21:16:07","modified_gmt":"2025-09-24T21:16:07","slug":"b-c-green-party-elects-emily-lowan-as-new-leader","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/166939\/","title":{"rendered":"B.C. Green Party elects Emily Lowan as new leader"},"content":{"rendered":"

Open this photo in gallery:<\/a><\/p>\n

New Green Party leader Emily Lowan says the party will become a ‘force of nature’ and a ‘bold and critical’ opposition party.HO\/The Canadian Press<\/p>\n

Emily Lowan, a 25-year-old climate activist, is the new leader of the British Columbia Green Party. <\/p>\n

Lowan won with 3,189 first-place votes, ahead of second-place Jonathan Kerr with 1,908 votes, while Adam Bremner-Akins finished third with 128 votes. A total of 8,641 eligible members cast their votes in the ranked-ballot election for a turnout of 61 per cent. <\/p>\n

\u201cThis campaign was electrifying,\u201d Lowan told a room of supporters in Victoria, where the results were announced Wednesday. \u201cIt was a lightning rod of hope. We brought in thousands of new members to this party, many of whom were completely disillusioned with politics.\u201d <\/p>\n

Lowan doesn\u2019t have a seat in the legislature, but said she plans to run in the next \u201cviable\u201d by-election or in a general election. <\/p>\n

There are two Greens currently sitting in the legislature, Rob Botterell and Jeremy Valeriote, who has been acting as the interim leader of the party. <\/p>\n

The party signed a co-operation and responsible government accord with New Democrats after David Eby won a narrow victory over the B.C. Conservatives in last year\u2019s election. <\/p>\n

Lowan said that the Greens should consider an \u201cexpedited\u201d renegotiating of pact, which is reviewable annually. <\/p>\n

Her decisive mandate is a \u201cclear message\u201d that the party needs to do something differently, Lowan said. <\/p>\n

She said her election is also a \u201cwake-up call\u201d for the governing New Democrats, who can no longer take \u201cprogressive\u201d voters for granted.<\/p>\n

Lowan promised to build a \u201cformidable political movement\u201d to take on B.C.\u2019s largest corporations, billionaires and big oil, \u201cwho take far more than they give.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Greens will become a \u201cforce of nature,\u201d she said, while promising to be a \u201cbold and critical\u201d opposition party.<\/p>\n

Former leader Sonia Furstenau lost her bid for re-election in last year\u2019s election and stepped down from the post in January. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Open this photo in gallery: New Green Party leader Emily Lowan says the party will become a ‘force…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":166940,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[901,888,902,879,877,903,48,876,895,896,891,878,875,46,549,295,894,887,914,880,881,893,43,889,890,884,904,885,909,910,44,912,907,911,905,908,882,898,899,714,897,906,865,61,41,39,42,40,900,892,886,883,913],"class_list":["post-166939","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-alberta","tag-arts-news","tag-bc","tag-breaking-news","tag-breaking-news-video","tag-british-columbia","tag-canada","tag-canada-news","tag-canada-sports","tag-canada-sports-news","tag-canada-trafficcanada-weather","tag-canadian-breaking-news","tag-canadian-news","tag-economy","tag-education","tag-environment","tag-federal-government","tag-foreign-news","tag-globe-and-mail","tag-globe-and-mail-breaking-news","tag-globe-and-mail-canada-news","tag-government","tag-headlines","tag-life-news","tag-lifestyle","tag-local-news","tag-manitoba","tag-national-news","tag-new-brunswick","tag-newfoundland-and-labrador","tag-news","tag-northwest-territories","tag-nova-scotia","tag-nunavut","tag-ontario","tag-pei","tag-photos","tag-political-news","tag-political-opinion","tag-politics","tag-politics-news","tag-quebec","tag-sports-news","tag-technology","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories","tag-travel","tag-trudeau","tag-us-news","tag-world-news","tag-yukon"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/166939","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=166939"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/166939\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/166940"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=166939"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=166939"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=166939"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}