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NDP’s Shelley Cook to try again in Kelowna West

After losing to Christy Clark in May, Cook will vie for the seat again when a byelection is called
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Former John Howard Society boss will run for the NDP is new Kelowna-West riding byelection. —Image: contributed

For the second time in a row, the NDP in Kelowna West is turning to the candidate who ran for the party in the previous provincial election in the hope of winning a byelection

Shelley Cook will be acclaimed as the NDP’s candidate in the upcoming byelection Dec. 3 despite the fact the date of the byelection has yet to be announced.

The former executive director of the John Howard Society in Kelowna, who is currently pursuing her doctorate at UBCO, finished second to then-B.C. premier and Liberal leader Christy Clark in May’s provincial election in Kelowna West.

Clark resigned her seat and quit politics in August when it became clear the NDP would push the B.C. Liberals from power with the help of the B.C. Green Party. In the provincial election, the Liberals won one more seat then the NDP but the combined NDP-Green strength in the B.C. Legislature was enough to defeat the Liberals in a non-confidence vote.

New NDP Premier John Horgan has yet to set a date for the Kelowna West byelection but must do so before Feb. 5. He is expected to be in attendance at the Dec. 3 NDP nomination meeting.That meeting will be held at the Holiday Inn Hotel in West Kelowna with registration starting at 2:30 p.m.

Cook will run against the riding’s former Liberal MLA, Ben Stewart, who quit just weeks after he was re-elected in the 2013 provincial election, to allow Clark to run in a byelection. Clark had lost her Vancouver-area seat in the provincial election.

Clark easily won the subsequent byelection, defeating the NDP’s Carole Gordon, who had lost to Stewart.

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