IN DEPTH: Hansard does not back claim that Findlay's defectors are ‘secret Liberals’

PENTICTON — A popular explanation and argument circulating since the Conservative Party of BC walkouts began last week is simple: the MLAs leaving Kerry-Lynne Findlay are doing so because they are Liberals.The theory further holds that the shrinking Conservative bench is either a self-purge or a surreptitious hostile takeover and whatever remains will be stronger and better for it, because that will be the true, real, and authentic Conservative party people are looking for.Hansard voting records from the spring sitting, however, do not carry that story.The seven sitting members who have left Findlay's caucus since August 14 are Peter Milobar, Ian Paton, Rosalyn Bird, Teresa Wat, Brennan Day, Bruce Banman, and Á'a:líya Warbus. Four of them once sat as BC Liberals. One ran as a Liberal and lost. Two never wore the label at all. All seven voted the Conservative line on the money bills that closed the last session..Optically, it is easy to see how the theory took hold. The Conservatives elected in 2024 looked, on the surface, like a big tent. John Rustad made a Stó:lō filmmaker his house leader.Christy Clark-era cabinet ministers sat beside Peace River ranchers. The same caucus that later voted to give Halford's DRIPA repeal first reading also contained members who talked about progressive conservatism and building a bridge across a culture war.The clip that did the most work on that file is the now infamous lightbulb video.On the Nuanced with Aaron Pete podcast in September 2025, Warbus answered a post from Tim Thielmann that said settlers had given indigenous people the light bulb."Well, guess what, we didn't ask for any of that," she said, in a discussion about efforts to recast residential schools as mostly good..The line moved like wildfire through British Columbia's right-of-centre social media circles within days.It recirculated through the 2026 leadership contest and then recirculated, again, the morning she walked..The optics also run the other way, however.Banman is the sixth name on the walkout list and one of the four former Liberal MLAs. He is also the member this reporter nicknamed Brace Yourself Banman.On October 4, 2023, three weeks after he crossed from BC United and gave the Conservatives the second seat they needed for official party status, he told the House to brace itself and read a sexually explicit passage from the young-adult novel Eleanor & Park, then on shelves in Abbotsford school libraries. Speaker Raj Chouhan made him retract it on the spot..His leadership slogan was "Conservative without apology."A former Liberal who made the Speaker gavel down a library-book reading to demonstrate hyper progressiveness is an awkward exhibit for a purge of Liberals.So is a 23-year navy logistics officer and a Stó:lō house leader who voted Yea, with the rest of the official opposition, on Tara Armstrong's gender bill. The tent was real.And the Hansard voting records demonstrate that clearly.On February 26 they voted Nay on the budget motion. They voted Nay on second and third reading of the Budget Measures Implementation Act, 2026. Where Hansard records them on the companion budget bill and on the May 28 Supply Act, 2026-27, they voted Nay. Those are the votes that fund David Eby's government.A Liberal caucus in the old sense would have been on the other side of the aisle, or at least demonstrated some, or any, level of disunity or indecision..They also showed up for the two files Findlay's supporters treat as the ultimate conservative test: DRIPA.Surrey-White Rock MLA Trevor Halford introduced a Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples Repeal Act on April 22. First reading is the lowest bar in the House, and the New Democrats still forced a division and killed the bill. All seven of the later walkouts voted Yea.They voted Yea the same spring on first reading of the Interpretation Amendment Act, 2026, the private-member attempt to unwind section 8.1, the 2021 clause that tells every court to construe provincial law as consistent with the UN Declaration.That is the opposite of a pro-DRIPA bloc. The 2019 Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples Act did pass unanimously, and three of these seven — Wat, Milobar, and Paton — were in the Liberal seats that voted for it. So did every other member of the House, including the MLAs now held up as the purified remnant. Banman had not been elected yet. Bird, Day, and Warbus were not in the building.Using a seven-year-old unanimous vote to brand only the people who have now left is a selective reading of the same roll call..The one bill that actually split the seven is the one the party did not whip.The K'ómoks Treaty Act passed third reading on May 28, 53 to 39. Milobar, Banman, Bird, and Wat voted Nay at second reading and Nay again at third. Paton voted Nay at second reading and Yea at third. Day and Warbus voted Yea at third reading.The private-member bills from Independent MLA Tara Armstrong offer perhaps the best evidence for debunking the Liberal purge and takeover theories.On February 19 she brought the Gender Ideology and Child Protection Act. The House killed it at first reading, 49 to 38. Banman, Bird, Paton, and Warbus were in the Yea column with Halford, McInnis, Jody Toor, Donegal Wilson, and John Rustad..On February 26, Armstrong brought the Human Rights Code Repeal Act. Hansard records Banman, Bird, Day, Milobar, Paton, Wat, and Warbus as Yea on first reading. The New Democrats and Greens voted the bill down.Attorney General Niki Sharma later put out a statement the same day accusing the Conservative caucus of voting to legalize discrimination.The seven did not peel off onto the government side when Armstrong's bills came up, nor did they run and hide when accused of being racists by the Attorney General. They stood with the same Conservative names now described as the purified caucus..Biography is the part of the claim that is true, and it is only true for some of them.Wat sat in Christy Clark's cabinet as minister of international trade. She crossed from BC United on July 30, 2024, won Richmond-Bridgeport that October with 58.19%, and left Findlay on August 26 after a leaked leadership-campaign chat branded her "CCP" and the promised apology never arrived.Banman won Abbotsford South as a Liberal in 2020, crossed to John Rustad on September 13, 2023, and gave the Conservatives the second MLA they needed for official party status. He left August 27 and called Findlay unelectable.Milobar has been the Kamloops MLA since 2017, first as a Liberal, later as finance critic under Findlay. Paton has farmed in Delta South since 2017 and crossed in 2024.Day ran for the Liberals in Courtenay-Comox in 2020, lost, came back as a Conservative in 2024 and won by 92 votes.Bird did none of that. She is a 23-year navy logistics officer who succeeded Shirley Bond in Prince George-Valemount in 2024.Warbus is a Stó:lō member, the daughter of former lieutenant-governor Steven Point, and the first Stó:lō person elected to the legislature. Rustad made her Official Opposition House Leader. Findlay dropped her from that post on June 29. She left Monday morning..Tom Fletcher wrote in these pages last week that a purge of perceived Liberals had already backfired, and that the casualties included "some of the least Liberal of them."Hansard is the footnote to that sentence and also provides the receipts..Findlay won the leadership on May 30 promising to stop a liberal takeover. She does not have a provincial voting record of her own. She is not an MLA. The record that exists belongs to the people who have been standing in the House since February 2025, and it does not sort them into the piles the purge story needs.The seven have also offered different reasons for leaving, with almost none of them relating to policy.Milobar cited values and direction.Paton alleged a paid job offer if he vacated his seat.Bird said Findlay yelled at her and hung up after she refused to surrender Prince George-Valemount.Wat wanted the "CCP" line corrected. Day said he had lost confidence in Findlay's "judgment, conduct, ethical standards and those she has chosen to surround herself with."Banman said voters had decided the new leader is unelectable.Warbus pointed to a postponed Richmond caucus, a communication breakdown, and a parade of hirings and firings she learned about on social media.Those are leadership, staff, ethical, and operational competency complaints. They are not evidence, let alone even suggestive, of a surreptitious attempt by "secret Liberals" to undermine the leader.The legislature returns October 5. That will be the real test to see if the members being recast as "secret Liberals" change their votes while sitting as Independents. Commentators on X can continue calling the walkouts secret Liberals until then.But if the votes don't change in the next session, at a certain point, they will have to accept the explanation is flawed and the theory is spent.

IN DEPTH: Hansard does not back claim that Findlay's defectors are ‘secret Liberals’

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