TheBritish Columbia Recall and Initiative Referendum was areferendum held inBritish Columbia on October 17, 1991. It was concurrent withthat year's general election. The referendum posed two questions. They were on whether elected officials should be able to berecalled and whether voters should be given acitizen's initiative. Both questions were decisively approved with over 80% of the electorate voting yes to both questions.

British Columbia has had several referendums in its history.^[1] A previous bill, theDirect Legislation Act, was passed by theOliver government in 1919. theDirect Democracy Act was givenroyal assent in March of that year, but was neverproclaimed. A similar statute was struck down by theManitoba Court of Appeals later that year. These combined to leave the BC law in legislative limbo until it was removed in a 1924 statute consolidation.^[2]

A promise to hold referendums was included in theBritish Columbia Social Credit Party (Socred) government'sspeech from the throne in April 1990.^[3] In preparation, the Socreds had invited two experts from California familiar with recall and initiative to their annual convention.^[4] Appropriate legislation was introduced on July 5, 1990.^[5]

The two questions were:

A: Should the voters be given the right, by legislation, to vote between elections for theremoval of theirmember of the Legislative Assembly?^[6]

B: Should the voters be given the right, by legislation, topropose questions that theGovernment of British Columbia must submit to voters byreferendum?^[6]

Both of the questions were announced by PremierRita Johnston during a news conference on September 5, 1991, although by then they were anopen secret. NDP leaderMike Harcourt criticized the timing, saying that the Socreds had moved too slowly in launching the proposals.^[4]Liberal leaderGordon Wilson also criticized the referendum, saying that it was intended to divert attention away from thescandal-plagued Socreds.^[7] In response, Johnston said she could not comment on either timing or structure for the proposals because they would be decided after the referendum.^[4]

The referendum was run byAttorney-GeneralRuss Fraser. The total cost was 1.7 million dollars. The cost includes information pamphlets, advertising, toll-free information telephone lines, and costs related to running the referendum.^[4]

The referendum also got caught up in thecampaign going on at the same time. Both Premier Johnston andBritish Columbia New Democratic Party (NDP) leader Harcourt announced that they would be voting yes in the referendum.^[4]

There was overwhelming support for both questions. Support was over 80% of yes votes for both questions.^[8] However, more than nine percent of ballots for question A were rejected, and more than eleven percent were rejected for question B.Turnout was slightly less than that in the general election.^[2]

British Columbia's legislation made a referendum binding only on the government that called it. As the Socreds had been defeated, the incoming NDP government was not required to enable recall and initiative. Nevertheless, Premier-electMike Harcourt announced that his government would be bound by the results.^[11] As a consequence, theRecall and Initiative Act was passed and entered into force on February 24, 1995.^[6]In 1998, MLAPaul Reitsma resigned his seat when it appeared that a recall petition would be successful and he could be the first person recalled under the legislation.

As of April 2023, according to Elections BC theRecall and Initiative Act has been invoked:

• 29 times with registered Recall petitions, all of which are deemed to have failed;^[12][13]
• 14 times with registered Initiative petitions, of which only one passed (see2011 British Columbia sales tax referendum).^[14]

• Politics of British Columbia
• Referendums in Canada
• William Aberhart, the first politician in Canada ever to be subject to a recall campaign

• Elections BC

• 1991 elections in Canada
• October 1991 in Canada
• 1991 in British Columbia
• 1991 referendums
• Referendums in British Columbia
• Initiatives

• Articles with short description
• Short description with empty Wikidata description
• Use mdy dates from September 2023