B.C. Green Party Leader Sonia Furstenau answers questions from media after providing a statement in Victoria, Wednesday, Oct. 23, 2024. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Chad Hipolito

VICTORIA - The leader of the B.C. Green Party has stepped down after losing her seat in last year's election but neither of the two elected Green members are interested in taking over the top job.

Sonia Furstenau was greeted with hugs by volunteers, family and staff on Tuesday as she entered a news conference in Victoria, B.C., where she announced her decision.

The Greens have only two elected members in the legislature; Jeremy Valeriote, who represents West Vancouver-Sea to Sky, and Rob Botterell of Saanich North and the Islands.

Valeriote has been named interim party leader until the leadership race is complete.

Neither Valeriote nor Botterell will run for the leadership, they said during the news conference.

That means the new leader will have to come from outside of the legislature where the Greens are currently the third party.

The rules of the leadership contest are expected to be released in February and the new leader will be chosen in September, said Molly McKay, the Green Party's interim executive director.

Andrew Weaver, who led the party from 2015 to 2020 and clashed with Furstenau, said he was not surprised she stepped down but was surprised that neither Valeriote nor Botterell want to replace her.

"I don't know how they could function if the leader isn't in the legislature, and there are two MLAs in the legislature," Weaver said in a phone interview, adding that he expects one of the members will ultimately need to step aside for the new leader to run in a byelection.

"The party is so small and its infrastructure so skeletal that it needs to be streamlined and you cannot have a streamlined process when the party spokesperson is not in the (legislature)."

Furstenau, 54, said she never aspired to be an elected official but is leaving her role as leader feeling a great sense of accomplishment.

She noted her party's role helping draft the government's CleanBC plan that aims to lower climate-changing emissions by 40 per cent by 2030, that the Greens were at the table to discuss forest policy and the protection of Fairy Creek, and the Greens were involved in an all-party committee to consider how to make the electoral system and democracy work better.

Furstenau was elected to represent Cowichan Valley in 2017, when the Greens were first elected to the B.C. Legislature and its three members held the balance of power in the NDP government's minority government.

"As the first Green Caucus in Canada, we blazed a trail," Furstenau said.

Her team was part of significant change that lobbied for reform and greater transparency, she said.

In 2020, when Weaver stepped down as leader and left the party to sit as an Independent, Furstenau became party leader. Shortly after, then-premier John Horgan called a mid-pandemic election and won a healthy majority that ended the need for a confidence-and-supply agreement with the Greens.

In the October 2024 election, Furstenau ran in Victoria and failed to win a seat in the legislature. After the election she said she would stay on as leader to help the two newly elected Green members navigate the prospect of the party holding the balance of power once again.

But a series of recounts denied the Greens that power and David Eby's NDP came away with 47 seats and a one-seat majority.

Furstenau said Tuesday that politics and democracy now face a difficult road.

"There are growing threats to democracies in the United States, across Europe and here in Canada," she said.

"We can't accept the denial of the serious and real challenges that we face collectively, a billionaire class turning into an oligarchy, deepening inequality, a loss of trust and faith in public institutions and democracy and climate change and the chaos that stems from it."

Building connected and vibrant communities are an antidote to hateful rhetoric coming from some of the people who wield power in the world today, she said.

"There's too much at risk for our generations and many to follow. We can choose to act with courage or cowardice," Furstenau said.

"I've always tried and will continue to endeavour to act with courage and with love."

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Jan. 28, 2025.

News from © The Canadian Press, 2025