Peter Milobar and Todd Stone take the stage for their acceptance speeches at Hotel 540 following their election wins on May 9, 2017.

(KIM ANDERSON / iNFOnews.ca)

KAMLOOPS - MLA candidates in the North and South Thompson ridings got what they paid for in the B.C. Provincial election back in May as the best funded and highest spending campaign belong to the two politicians who got the most votes.

In the Kamloops-South Thompson riding, B.C. Liberal candidate Todd Stone retained his seat while spending $120,750. He biggest expenses were about $28,000 for media advertising and $21,200 for research and polling. Most of his funding came directly from the B.C. Liberal Party with just over $1,000 being contributed from independent donors. With Stone picking up 14,321 votes in the election, each vote cost about $8.50.

Second place in South Thompson went to the B.C. NDP's Nancy Bepple who spent just shy of $30,500 to pick up 5,430 votes, followed by the B.C. Green Party's Donovan Cavers who spent $27,000 on 5,180 votes. While both Bepple and Cavers also spent the most money on advertising and promotional materials, neither spent any money on research and polling.

Rounding out the SouthThompson ticket was Beat Klossner of the Communist Party who spent $250 on 98 votes and Libertarian Jessica Bradshaw who picked up 269 votes with $135 in campaign spending.

Moving to the Kamloops-North Thompson riding, campaign spending equaled campaign success for B.C. Liberal Peter Milobar as he spent over $104,300 and won the seat. Milobar spent the most on advertising with close to $27,800, but he also spent a pretty penny on salaries and benefits with about $17,700 going to employees. The former Kamloops mayor took 10,921 votes, so his campaign paid about $9.50 for each "X" next to his name on the ballot.

Like Stone, most of Milobar's funding came from the Liberal party with just $1,900 from donors.

The second highest spending candidate in Kamloops-North Thompson also garnered the second most votes with the NDP's Barb Nederpel spending just over $90,500 on 6,730 votes. At around $13.50 per vote, Nederpel paid the highest premium for each vote she picked up among all the candidates in either Kamloops riding.

Other Kamloops-North Thompson candidates included the B.C. Green Party's Dan Hines who spent about $33,200 for 4,521 votes and Peter Kerek of the Communist party who spent $250 for 164 votes.

Find past stories on the 2017 B.C. Election here.

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