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How would you ideologically classify a political party that ran on a platform of tax cuts and balanced budgets? Youd probably say you need a bit more information, given cutting taxes and balancing budgets are hardly distinctive ideas. In Canadas 2011 election, for instance, Jack Laytons NDP, Michael Ignatieffs Liberals and Stephen Harpers Conservatives all ran promising to pursue this agenda, as have a rainbow of parties at the provincial level.

If I added that this theoretical party supports a carbon tax, safe injection sites for heroin addicts, and legalized marijuana, but opposes a major pipeline, you might think were in comfortably left-wing territory.

Well, youd be wrong, at least according to the Canadian news media, who have decided the ruling Liberal Party of British Columbia currently fighting for their fifth term in office are actually a party of the right. Read any mainstream coverage or analysis of B.C. politics and youll come across references to the centre right, right-of-centre, or right-leaning Liberals. No less an authority than The New York Times spoke of Premier Christy Clarks conservative British Columbia Liberal Party. The Vancouver Sun has started using Tory blue for the Liberals in their polling graphics, while a premier-ranking study from Vancouver think tank Aha! grouped B.C.s Liberal premiers in with other provinces Tory leaders on the grounds they were small c-conservative.

Its forgivable on some level. The press needs a firm party of the right fighting a firm party of the left to create compelling political drama. If youre a partisan of the NDP B.C.s provincial opposition its similarly in your interests to portray Liberals and Conservatives as interchangeable oppressors of the proletariat, as NDPers have been doing since Tommy Douglas first yarned about mice voting for cats.

Yet to call the B.C. Liberals conservatives because theyve experienced occasional bouts of fiscal responsibility, appeased business interests, or annoyed unions the sole evidence proponents of this theory point to requires broadening the philosophy of conservatism to the point of uselessness. The Saskatchewan NDP closed schools and hospitals across the province during the 1990s. Were they right-wing? The Alberta Conservatives ran six deficit budgets in a row. Was that centre-left? Is Dalton McGuinty a small-c conservative because a teachers strike occurred during his reign?

As Stephen Harper himself put it in a 2003 speech on ideology if conservatives accept all legislated social liberalism with balanced budgets and corporate grants then there really are no differences between a conservative and a Paul Martin.

The B.C. Liberals, for their part, have never fully played along with the right-wing role theyve been assigned. When I interviewed Christy Clark back in 2004 she called herself a middle-of-the-road Liberal, emphasizing shed been a provincial Liberal when we used to get 5per centof the vote (theres a popular urban legend that the B.C. Liberals are a new party or even the renamed B.C. Social Credit Party in reality, theyve been contesting elections since the 19th century). That said, Clarks Liberals are savvy enough to grasp a good thing when they see it. In their propaganda, they refer to themselves as a free market coalition welcoming anyone anti-NDP. The party uses the four colours of the B.C. flag red, white, blue and yellow in their branding, rather than one traditionally partisan colour, to push the notion that they transcend classification.

And it works, in the sense surveys generally show the partys base is roughly split between federal Conservative and Liberal voters, who tend to see in the party whatever they want. A recent Insights West poll had 49per centof federal Conservative voters describing the B.C. Libs as a right or centre-right party, while 37per centof federal Liberals called it left-wing or centrist. A narrow majority of British Columbians see them as either left-wing, centrist, or cant answer the question. Over 20per centof NDP voters, meanwhile, call it far-right.

Someone has to be wrong here. The B.C. Liberals can be called right wing by the press and even other conservatives, but if they reach this conclusion without using a strict, objective standard, the label simply makes British Columbias political debate lazy and incoherent.

Sloppiness with the right-wing label can also be rather unfair to the B.C. NDP, it must be said, since it defines their own leftism in such a crude and caricatured way. The B.C. NDP does not hate low taxes or love the idea of being fiscally irresponsible indeed, the party actually opposed the two most significant tax increases of the Liberal reign Premier Gordon Campbells 2008 carbon tax and his governments subsequent harmonized sales tax (overturned by referendum in 2011). The Liberals often creatively-calculated balanced budgets, meanwhile, mask a reliance on debt, unsurprising, given their election platforms including the current one tend to be brimming with conventionally big-LLiberal promises to spend more doing everything.

B.C.s former opposition leader, Adrian Dix, once complained that the partisan split in B.C. was like comparing Coke to Pepsi. If the B.C. NDP finds its way back to power next month, the outcome may prove far more meaningful for the party than the province.

National Post

J.J. McCullough is a political commentator and artist living in Vancouver.

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Christy Clark's BC Liberals are left, right and centre, but they sure aren't 'conservative' - National Post