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If there's one MLA that mobilizes the social-media crowd against the B.C. Liberals, it's former deputy premier Rich Coleman.

First elected in 1996, Coleman has been a mainstay on the B.C. Liberal side of the house for more than 20 years.

When the B.C. Liberals were in government, he oversaw some highly controversial files in cabinet, including housing, casino gambling, liquor distribution, and liquefied natural gas.

Coleman has also been a top B.C. Liberal fundraiser, interacting with some of the province's richest residents on behalf of his party.

Last year, however, Coleman came under severe criticism from the NDP in the wake of the Dirty Money report, which focused on the extent of money laundering in B.C. casinos.

And this week, Premier John Horgan linked Coleman to the appointment of the now suspended clerk of the legislature, Craig James.

At a news conference in Prince George, Horgan said that James received his lifetime position "at the whim of Rich Coleman", who was then B.C. Liberal house leader.

Horgan called this "absolutely unprecedented". And he emphasized that a bipartisan committee should have sought applications and made a recommendation to the legislature.

Premier John Horgan has blamed former deputy premier Rich Coleman for the hiring of Craig James as clerk of the legislature.

B.C. Liberals tarred with legislature scandal

A recently released bombshell report by Speaker Darryl Plecas has led to a media firestorm about James's management of the legislative assembly and the oversight of expense claims.

The report chronicles employee terminations without cause, lavish trips abroad, and payouts in lieu of vacation time not taken.

Plecas also linked the lack of James's vacation time to work that he performed for the World Bank.

None of the allegations have been tested in court.

James and the sergeant-at-arms, Gary Lenz, were placed on paid administrative leave in November. Both have insisted they've done nothing wrong.

In fact, James told CBC News this week that he intends to file a reply to Plecas's report.

In the meantime, the B.C. Liberals have taken a hit from this story in the midst of a crucial by-election campaign in Nanaimo.

In part, that's because B.C. Liberal Leader Andrew Wilkinson suggested last November that Plecas was "out of control" by launching an investigation into senior staff at the legislative assembly.

It left an impression with some that the B.C. Liberals were sympathetic to James and Lenz after they had been escorted out of the legislature by police.

At the time, the B.C. Liberals were particularly critical of the role of Plecas's aide, Alan Mullen, who was brought in last January.

The media played along by questioning Mullen's qualifications for conducting an investigation of this magnitude.

This week, Wilkinson and his party's house leader, Mary Polak, called for more transparency in the operations of the legislature.

Polak has defended her caucus's previous actions, saying the B.C. Liberals were the only ones asking hard questions in the wake of the suspensions of James and Lenz.

That resulted in a blizzard of criticism over social media, with one of James's foremost critics, blogger Norm Farrell, telling her that the B.C. Liberals owe Plecas an apology.

This week, James is being linked to the B.C. Liberals in a number of ways, not the least of which is through the Plecas report itself.

There's been a fair amount of media coverage of James's repeated visits to Vancouver and the Okanagan in 2017 and 2018 to meet ex-B.C. Liberal MLAs, including former premier Christy Clark, for which James expensed taxpayers.

The B.C. Liberal connection is also reinforced by coverage of spending controversies that dogged former B.C. Liberal speaker Linda Reid.

As well, this is happening via coverage of a reference in Plecas's report to a missing truckload of liquor—and his unproven suggestion that it may have ended up at the home of former B.C. Liberal speaker Bill Barisoff. Barisoff later told his local newspaper in Penticton that he never received this liquor.

There have also been reminders of James's controversial oversight of the HST referendum when he was acting chief electoral officer, and his firing of deputy chief electoral officer Linda Johnson.

Assistant deputy speaker Linda Reid was first elected in 1991, making her the senior member of the B.C. legislature.

B.C. Liberal rebranding requires fresh faces

As long as Coleman is sitting on the B.C. Liberal side of the house, the NDP and B.C. Greens can continue to blame him for giving James so much power in the first place.

For now, the B.C. Liberals are pinning their hopes on winning the Wednesday (January 30) by-election in Nanaimo.

If they pull off an upset, the B.C. Liberals will have 43 members in the house—the same number as the B.C. NDP and B.C. Greens.

That could force a spring election.

But some commentators feel it's more likely that the B.C. Liberals will lose this campaign, based on how often the NDP has taken this seat in the past.

If that happens, the B.C. Liberals can expect to remain in opposition for a couple more years before the next general election.

So far, the NDP has been fairly effective at portraying the B.C. Liberals as being soft on wrongdoing—whether it's in connection with money laundering, runaway spending at the legislature, campaign finance regulations, or poor regulation of the real-estate sector.

Rich Coleman can be tied to all of those areas. And he and other B.C. Liberals have given the NDP plenty of ammunition.

In fact, Coleman has become a B.C. Liberal liability as the NDP continues making him the poster boy for why the former governing party should remain in the political penalty box.

If Coleman is truly interested in the well-being of the B.C. Liberals in the wake of a future loss in the Nanaimo by-election, he should get out of the way as quickly as possible so his party can rebuild.

If Nanaimo voters stick with the NDP, Wilkinson should urge Coleman to resign his seat and make room for fresh blood.

A Coleman resignation would undermine the NDP's ongoing campaign, dating back to 2016, to brand the B.C. Liberals as the party that turns a blind eye to unethical practices.

Another former house leader, Mike de Jong, should also think about leaving B.C. politics for the same reason. He was first elected in 1994.

The same can be said for Linda Reid, who's been in the legislature since 1991.

They all occupy safe B.C. Liberal seats. If Wilkinson's party were to recapture all of them in by-elections, it would give him some momentum going into the next general election.

Christy Clark was smart enough to get out of the way after her party lost power in 2017. Nowadays, she rarely shows up in the news.

In the wake of the legislature spending fiasco, Wilkinson can only truly start to rebrand his party—and counter the NDP's efforts to paint the B.C. Liberals as not having clean hands—by encouraging three of his longest-serving MLAs to head for the exits as soon as possible.

It's Wilkinson's best chance of winning the next general election.