The race to replace Christy Clark as BC Liberal Leader is heating up with yet another candidate stepping forward.
Newly elected Vancouver-Langara MLA Michael Lee is the latest name to make it to the ballot.
In a speech announcing his candidacy on Tuesday, Lee blamed the BC Liberals 2017 election defeat on the party losing voters’ trust.
“What matters most in this race is the members of this party and new members we want to join us,” he said.
“We want to come forward to rebuild that party, to rebuild that trust. But we’re looking towards the future, and that’s what I’m doing. I’m coming forward with that new way.”
Unlike former cabinet ministers Mike de Jong, Mike Bernier and Andrew Wilkinson, as a neophyte, MLA Lee enters the race with a degree of outsider status and absent the baggage associated with 16 years of Liberal rule.
However, his campaign team is also packed with well-connected Liberals.
Lee said it’s not just party insiders supporting him.
“I’ve had a broad team for this campaign, and for me, I started in youth politics, working for Kim Campbell back in the 1990’s,” he said.
WATCH: B.C. Liberal leadership race attracts more candidates
“I know what it takes to build an organization, many of us, the people that you’re talking about, started that way.”
Lee, a business lawyer, has been active behind the scenes with the BC Liberals since 2002.
He joins an already crowded field that also includes former Surrey Mayor and Conservative MP Dianne Watts, former Vancouver Mayor Sam Sullivan, and Terrace businesswoman Lucy Sager.
The BC Liberals will choose their next leader by an online and telephone vote Feb. 1-3.
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