Editing BC United (section)

===1952 election===
In order to prevent the CCF from winning in a three-party competition, the government introduced [[instant-runoff voting]], with the expectation that Conservative voters would list the Liberals as their second choice and vice versa. Voters, however, were looking for alternatives. More voters chose [[British Columbia Social Credit Party|British Columbia Social Credit League]] ahead of any other party as their second choice. Social Credit went on to emerge as the largest party when the ballots were counted in the [[1952 British Columbia general election|1952 general election]]. Social Credit's ''de facto'' leader during the election, [[W. A. C. Bennett]], formerly a Conservative, was formally named party leader after the election.

At the [[1953 British Columbia general election|1953 general election]], the Liberals were reduced to four seats, taking 23.36% of the vote. [[Arthur Laing]] defeated [[Tilly Rolston]] in Vancouver Point Grey. Although Social Credit won a majority of seats in the legislature, their finance minister [[Einar Gunderson]] was defeated in [[Oak Bay (electoral district)|Oak Bay]] by [[Philip Archibald Gibbs]] of the Liberals. [[Gordon Gibson Sr]], a millionaire timber baron, nicknamed the "Bull of the Woods",<ref name="encyc">{{cite book |first1=Gordon |last1=Gibson|first2=Carol |last2=Renison|year=1980 |title=Bull of the Woods: The Gordon Gibson Story |publisher=Douglas & McIntyre |isbn=0-88894-292-3}}</ref> was elected for [[Lillooet (electoral district)|Lillooet]] as a Liberal.