The Culture-War Talking Points Popular with the BC Conservative Leadership Candidates

This article was originally published in PressProgress on 4/14/26.

Candidates in the running to become the new leader of the BC Conservatives have been seemingly borrowing from the same culture-war playbook, including rallying against supports for 2SLGBTQ+ students as well as Indigenous rights and land acknowledgements.

Since nine leadership candidates were initially approved in February, some longer-shot candidates have dropped out and endorsed others, but many of the remaining contestants’ platforms include dog whistles that have become increasingly common among the transnational right wing.

One candidate claims he is “uniting the right,” while others question each other’s adherence to “real” conservative values.

Last Wednesday, some of the candidates participated in a debate hosted by right-wing alternative media outlet Juno News, where the extent of their adherence to conservative values was put to the test.

Questions included whether candidates would scrap SOGI 123, a set of teaching materials intended to make queer and trans kids feel safe in schools; if they agreed with Danielle Smith’s Bill 26, which restricts the gender-affirming care that doctors can deliver to minors; and if, as premier, they would end DEI policies.

All four candidates that were present — Kerry-Lynne Findlay, Yuri Fulmer, Iain Black and Warren Hamm — voted “yes” to these questions. (Hamm has since dropped out and endorsed Fulmer.)

Findlay, a former member of Parliament, took to task two candidates who skipped the event, Caroline Elliott and Peter Milobar. “We have a couple of people who aren’t here tonight, who have a lot of explaining to do,” she said, “in terms of past support for SOGI, for DRIPA [the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples Act], for carbon tax, for condemning the Freedom Convoy, and other positions they took that are not conservative.”

While some of the leadership candidates have chosen to mostly focus on economic policies and fiscal conservatism, others have integrated the culture war into their platforms.

Ahead of the 2024 provincial election, then-leader John Rustad followed a similar playbook, only to quietly remove some of the more contentious aspects of his party’s platform shortly after the election was called.

Here’s what the candidates are saying about key election issues, and where they stand in their brand of “conservatism.”

2SLGBTQ+ teaching materials

One subject that Rustad, who was pushed out as leader in December, used as a wedge issue was support for 2SLGBTQ+ students, despite the fact that the policies had been brought in in 2016 by the BC Liberal government under an anti-bullying initiative. (The BC Liberals had long functioned as the province’s de facto conservative party but bowed out of the last election to throw their support behind the BC Conservatives.)

One of the talking points BC Conservative leadership candidates have jumped on is a promise to repeal the SOGI 123 teaching materials.

Among the most vocal anti-SOGI candidates has been Caroline Elliott, who has vowed to limit “ideology” in education and repeal SOGI 123.

According to Elliott’s platform, she plans to “Remove NDP activism from classrooms, including SOGI, critical race theory, decolonization, and other activist fads that divide students based on superficial characteristics.”

Another candidate who similarly has vowed to get rid of SOGI is Findlay, the former Conservative Party of Canada MP for South Surrey–White Rock.

In a speech, Findlay said she wants to get “this woke ideology out of our schools.”

Meanwhile, businessperson Yuri Fulmer rebutted a suggestion that he intended to “ditch the culture war” — he wants to win it.

He too clarified he does not support SOGI and wishes to repeal it, repeatedly — similar to Findlay — pledging his allegiance to “Conservative” values.

Former BC Liberal MLA Iain Black has also vowed to “repeal SOGI” and “remove divisive and ideological language from school-led activities.”

Peter Milobar, the current MLA for Kamloops Centre, did not explicitly name SOGI but has parroted similar talking points regarding “taking ideology out of the classroom.”

Land acknowledgements and Indigenous property rights

The Canadian right has recently honed in on Indigenous people and property rights as a new target du jour, reducing decades of colonial oppression to “past grievances.”

In a recent video interview with Without Diminishment, self-described as the “voice of Canada’s new right,” which she also co-founded, Elliott talked about some of the ideologies she objected to, which in addition to resources for 2SLGBTQ+ students, include land acknowledgements.

“The school system [is] constantly focusing on the wrongs of our past and never on our collective successes. You know, telling kids the land that they stand on doesn’t belong to them.”

Elliott has added into her platform her vow to remove land acknowledgments from schools.

Elliott also says she vows to repeal DRIPA and often repeats rhetoric about attacks on “Everyday British Columbians.”

Part of the goal of DRIPA, passed in 2019, is to bring provincial laws in line with the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. (BC’s current NDP government is looking to suspend portions of it.)

Findlay is another candidate stoking fear about “Aboriginal land claims and governance,” and referred to the experiences of Indigenous people as “past grievances,” that are being put ahead of “ordinary people.”

Findlay says she will “stop the extremism,” if elected.

Fulmer also has vowed to “repeal DRIPA” on “day one” in government.

Milobar has echoed the same sentiment of repealing DRIPA, but has clarified his intention of “affirming First Nation constitutional rights.”

Black also says he would repeal DRIPA and push back against what he calls “activist interference” in education, that teaches children “we are merely ‘settlers’ and ‘colonisers’ on occupied land.”

Black’s platform states that, if elected, he would “prohibit Indigenous land acknowledgements that use language like ‘colonizers’ or ‘settlers’ or ‘unceded,’ or refer to ‘stolen land’ and any ‘permission’ being granted to be on it.”

BC Human Rights Tribunal

Elliott has previously vowed to get rid of BC’s Human Rights Tribunal, after a controversial former school trustee was fined $750,000 for discriminating against members of the 2SLGBTQ+ community and exposing them “to hatred or contempt.”

Elliott called the ruling a “dystopian decision that reads like something out of a DEI fever dream.”

Black told Juno News he would not only get rid of the BC Human Rights Tribunal, but also wishes to get rid of the Office of the Human Rights Commissioner.

Findlay has also joined the chorus of right-wing actors wanting to make changes to the Human Rights Tribunal, but has not called for its outright abolition, saying she would instead rein in its “power to levy life-ruining fines.”

Fulmer also has not called for the elimination of the tribunal, but instead responded to the decision about the former trustee by saying, “We need a firewall against this radical, anti-freedom agenda.”

Milobar was one of the BC Conservative MLAs who voted to allow the introduction of a private member’s bill to repeal the BC Human Rights Code.

“Unite the Right”?

Fulmer has taken a specific path towards what he calls uniting the right, by partnering with Dallas Brodie, leader of OneBC, a right-wing party that has become known for its controversial takes despite losing its official party status in legislature.

At the end of March, Fulmer struck a deal with Brodie and OneBC to demonstrate public alignment and avoid “vote splitting” as well as what the Western Standard described as a “potential ideological shift toward the centre.”

As part of Fulmer’s deal, OneBC would “stand down” in 88 of BC’s 93 ridings, and in return, the BC Conservatives would not run candidates in five chosen ridings to “clear the path for OneBC.”

Fulmer did not indicate in which ridings they would plan to stand down, but Brodie has called the Unite the Right Accord “historic,” saying that she and Fulmer plan to “save British Columbia.”

Brodie added in a statement that she had been “approached by several candidates,” but ultimately decided to make the deal with Fulmer.

As the start of voting draws near, the race continues to bring more surprises each day.

In late March, Findlay’s campaign manager stepped down and endorsed Elliott instead.

Findlay, however, has made it clear on her social media platforms that she sees herself as a “Conservative by conviction, not by convenience,” alluding to how she does not want to be an “ideological floor-crosser.” Findlay’s message could be pointing toward Elliott, who previously served as an executive with the BC Liberals.

Over the weekend, Milobar dropped his campaign manager following an Elections BC investigation into the provenance of an anti-Rustad website in the last election.

Leadership contestants were to pay a $5,000 fee to the party when submitting their application, another $10,000 upon their candidacy’s approval and $40,000 more by April 1. An additional $60,000 instalment is due by April 18.

The new leader will be chosen on May 30.