The ballots are in and if it were up to B.C. students, the NDP would be our provincial leaders and the Single Transferable Vote would be our new electoral system.

The 58,000 B.C. students participating in Student Vote B.C. had their say Monday (May 16) and over 20,000 elected NDP candidates from 45 ridings compared to 16,000 voting for 25 Liberals.

The Green Party may have hope for the future in West Vancouver-Garibaldi, however. The party took the riding with 692 votes out of a total of 1,567. The Liberals came in a distant second with 417 votes and the NDP received 364. The victory went to the NDP at Howe Sound Secondary, but not as decisively as some students expected. While 300 participating students gave the NDP 137 votes, the Greens got 117, while the Liberals received 29 votes.

Don Ross Secondary students gave their support to the Greens with 135 votes out of 275. NDP came in second with 78 and the Liberals got 42.

Students also showed that they like the Single Transferable Vote system. Province-wide, 61.9 percent of the 35,000 voters, supported the system. In West Vancouver-Garibaldi, 61 percent, or 770 voters supported the system. At HSSS, 181 votes went in support of STV versus 108 opposed, and at Don Ross, 125 supported STV versus 122 opposed.

Student Vote BC is a non-partisan parallel election program aiming to build a habit of participation among students under the voting age.