Earlier, Public Eye reported rumours right-wingers had been planning to takeover the almost-dormant provincial Conservatives six weeks before that party announced it was merging with Unity. In the short-term, those planners wanted to prevent the Tories from splitting the right-wing vote by ensuring the party didn't run candidates in the next election. But we've now learned there were also long-term reasons for wanting to control the Conservatives. If the citizens' assembly ends up recommending a proportional representation system (and that recommendation is approved by British Columbians) smaller parties will have a better chance of winning seats in 2009. So the idea was to use the Conservatives as a vehicle for "mainstream" right-wing candidates who don't want to run as Liberals in that election.