Gordon Gibson

Gordon Gibson

Gordon Gibson, OBC (born 1937) is a political columnist, author, and former politician in British Columbia (BC), Canada. He is the son of the late Gordon Gibson Sr, who was a prominent businessman and Liberal Party politician in mid-1950s BC.

He received a BA(Honours) in Mathematics & Physics at the University of British Columbia, an MBA from the Harvard Business School, and did research work at the London School of Economics.

Gibson served as assistant to the federal Minister of Northern Affairs from 1963 to 1968, and was a special assistant to the Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau from 1968 to 1972. He ran as a federal Liberal candidate for the Canadian House of Commons in the 1972 federal election, but lost to Progressive Conservative candidate John Fraser by 3,000 votes.

Gibson won election to the Legislative Assembly of British Columbia by winning a 1974 by-election as a British Columbia Liberal Party candidate.

After three Members of the Legislative Assembly defected to the Social Credit Party three months prior to the 1975 provincial election, party leader David Anderson declined to be renominated for the position.

Gibson and Anderson were the only remaining Liberal MLAs. Gibson was approached to lead the party into the election. He won the party's only seat in the 1975 election.

He remained party leader until 1979, when he resigned to run again for a seat in the federal House of Commons. He was defeated in both the 1979 and 1980 federal elections. He lost to Progressive Conservative candidate Chuck Cook by less than 2,000 votes on both attempts.

He attempted to return to politics as a candidate in the 1993 provincial leadership convention, but came in second to future BC Premier Gordon Campbell.

Gibson has been a senior fellow in Canadian Studies at the Fraser Institute since 1993, and has written several books on Canadian federalism and governance. Following the 2001 provincial election, Gibson was hired by the government to make recommendations on the structure and mandate of the Citizens' Assembly on Electoral Reform. His report was substantially adopted.

His columns appear frequently in the Vancouver Sun, Winnipeg Free Press and the Globe & Mail.

In May 2008, Gibson was awarded the Order of British Columbia.