B.C. NDP candidate Stephanie Higginson is the projected MLA elect for the new Ladysmith-Oceanside riding.

With 19 of 19 final voting day ballot boxes and six of six advance ballot boxes counted for the 2024 B.C. general election, Higginson finished with a comfortable margin over Brett Fee of the Conservative Party of B.C. and Independent candidate Adam Walker.

Higginson had 13,417 votes (41.18 per cent), with Fee second at 11,671 (35.82 per cent), Walker third at 5,334 (16.37 per cent) and Laura Ferreira of the B.C. Green Party fourth at 2,162 (6.64 per cent).

"I feel ecstatic," said Higginson, among an enthusiastic group of supporters Saturday night in Qualicum Beach. "I got to meet so many wonderful people across Ladysmith-Oceanside during this campaign, hear their stories and hear what matters most to them and I am humbled they have given me the mandate to help support them and do the work they need me to do."

Higginson said her "worked their tails off" and the community showed "that they choose inclusion over division, they choose hope over negativity and they believe in the work we've been doing to try to solve those big issues."

Higginson and her family have lived in the Ladysmith-Oceanside area since 2010, where she and her husband raise their two children on a small farm in Cedar, she told the PQB News. She was twice-elected to the Nanaimo-Ladysmith Board of Education and is also a past president of the B.C. School Trustees’ Association. 

Higginson said she has started building relationships with local government representatives, community stakeholders and the chiefs and councils of the First Nations communities in the riding to ensure that she can hit the ground running on addressing the issues.

The first thing she wants to start working on?

"Health care, health care, health care for this community," she said. "That was very clear from everyone as I knocked on all those doors."

Walker, who was previously elected in 2020 as an NDP MLA for the old Parksville-Qualicum riding but ousted from caucus after an investigation into an unspecified human resources complaint, said during his four years, "we got a lot done".

"We had a health centre that we were hoping to move forward next year; we had some housing projects we were hoping to move on," he said. "But the community is very clear. They were hoping to see the NDP get in. The community has spoken and I am at peace with this. I've already phoned Stephanie and offered any help that I can in her new role. At the end of the day, I just want what's best for this community."

Walker, a former Qualicum Beach town councillor, said he didn't know what his political future might hold and planned to spend some time with his family.

"I owe my wife a couple of home-cooked meals," he said.

The 43rd provincial election marked the first to use a new electronic tabulation process for votes, however final counts will be by hand. That final count will happen between Oct. 26 and Oct. 28.

— With a file from Michael Briones