Lorne Doerkson met B.C.’s ATV riders a week before the vote, the fifth meeting we can document since 2024. His plan would write their access to the backcountry into law.

On Friday, 17 October, Lorne Doerkson held a meet and greet in 100 Mile House. Three men came in from the province’s quad riders: Cal Kaytor, president of ATVBC, the Quad Riders ATV Association of British Columbia; John Blinston, its first vice-president; and Mark Redl, its second vice-president and the founder of the local 108 ATV Club. They had their picture taken with the candidate, four men with their thumbs up in front of a blue banner that reads “Re-elect Lorne Doerkson, Cariboo-Chilcotin.”^1,2

Doerkson is the interim leader of the Conservative Party of BC and the MLA for Cariboo-Chilcotin, and on Saturday he asks the province to make him premier. The riders came to talk about the thing they ride on: the trails, the forest service roads that reach them, and whether the riding areas of the backcountry stay open to the public. Three days later Redl posted what they had talked about, and what they think of him.^1,3

That is the claim we test here. It was not the riders’ first meeting with him: we found four earlier ones since 2024, in the Legislature, in 100 Mile House and on the trail. The question for riders, and for everyone who uses the backcountry, is whether the man they keep meeting has a plan that keeps their trails and roads open.

01 Mark Redl wrote that Doerkson has been “a longtime supporter” of riding. ATVBC’s own page thanked him for his time, and stopped there.

Redl posted the account on his own Facebook profile and again in a riders’ group, writing in the association’s name: “ATVBC sincerely appreciates Lorne’s ongoing support and thanks him for taking the time to discuss these important priorities.” The association’s official page posted a shorter account of the same meeting, and it reads differently.^1,4

The official post calls the meeting “productive” and thanks Doerkson for his time. It does not call him a longtime supporter, and it does not mention his ongoing support. We found no account of the meeting on the association’s website. The warmer words are Redl’s, and he is one of three officers who were in the room.⁴

02 We found five meetings between Doerkson and the riders since 2024. At the first, in the Legislature, the snowmobile, dirt-bike and four-wheel-drive groups came too.

April 2024, Victoria. ATVBC’s staff went to the Legislature with the BC Snowmobile Federation, the BC Off Road Motorcycle Association and the Four Wheel Drive Association of BC to talk about “the systematic deactivation of access roads.” They met BC United MLAs, and Doerkson, whom ATVBC’s caption calls “Shadow Minister to Cullen,” is in the group photograph. ATVBC’s report from the trip said: “It is clear going into this next election, that all members are seeking our support and input.”⁵

November 2024, 100 Mile House. ATVBC’s executive director and two directors, John Blinston among them, met local officials, the RCMP and Doerkson to “explore the possibilities for Off-Road Vehicle (ORV) access into communities along the Gold Rush Snowmobile Trail.” ATVBC’s report on the visit carries no photograph of him.⁶

August 2025, the Gold Rush Snowmobile Trail. The 108 ATV Club ran what Redl called the MLA Ride: three days on the trail, which the club maintains with Recreation Sites and Trails B.C. Doerkson went out on the Thursday, on a ride announced as 25 kilometres from the 100 Mile House snowmobile clubhouse to Helena Lake, and came back to the clubhouse “with a face covered in dried mud,” the 100 Mile Free Press reported.^7,8

“I was really pleased to see just how focused (the club) was on safety,” he said, and added: “I enjoyed the heck out of it.” He and Redl used the ride to introduce Teresa Wat, the Conservative tourism critic, to ATVing; she told the paper she had not known what an ATV was. The paper does not say whether he drove or rode as a passenger, and we found no record that he owns an off-road vehicle.⁷

Redl told the paper what the ride was for: “We need money to revitalize our trails, to develop linking trails to other communities so we can do multi-day tours on off-road vehicles on trails that were established by farmers, ranchers and foresters over the last 100 years.” ATVBC’s own report on the ride put the goal as a chance to “bring ORV access from the Gold Rush Snowmobile Trail into communities along the trail from Clinton to Wells.”^7,9

June 2026, 100 Mile House. When the District of 100 Mile House held a public meeting on the 108 ATV Club’s proposal for four access routes linking the town to the trail, Doerkson was in the room with council and representatives of the Quad Riders ATV Association. The photograph the paper ran of the meeting is his.¹⁰

The paper did not report what he said at that meeting, and we found no statement from him for or against the routes. In October the riders came to his meet and greet. What the record shows is a local MLA who turns up when the riders ask.

03 ATVBC speaks for more than 40 riding clubs. Its fight this year has been with a government that is closing the roads riders use.

The association was registered as a society in March 2001. Its legal name is the Quad Riders ATV Association of British Columbia, and it says it “advocates for publicly accessible, mixed use trails across British Columbia.” It has more than 40 member clubs and about 4,500 members, and it hands out grant money to clubs for trail work.^2,11,12

It lobbies every side. In June 2025 it met Brittny Anderson, the NDP Minister of Local Government and Rural Communities, about getting riders into rural towns, and reported: “This meeting was well received.”¹³

This year its fight has been about access. When the Ministry of Forests moved to deactivate the road up the Incomappleux valley, ATVBC’s executive director at the time, Kristin Parsons, said: “We are shocked and disappointed that the Minister of Forests has not provided a substantive response to the coalition.” The new president, Cal Kaytor, says the association is open to anyone who shares its interest in “protecting access to British Columbia’s trails and backcountry.”^12,14

We found no endorsement of any party on the association’s website, and no 2026 questionnaire to the candidates. Its praise for Doerkson comes from its officers, in a post about one meeting.

04 Doerkson has called himself an outdoorsman since 2021. When he talks about the backcountry in the House, he talks about getting into it.

He came to riding of another kind first. In the 1990s he rode bareback in the BC Rodeo Association, and he later served as vice-president of the Williams Lake Stampede and announced rodeos across the Cariboo. “I competed in rodeos, rode horses bareback, and I wasn’t very good at it.” he told the House in 2024. We set out that life in full, with its sources, in our profile of him.¹⁵

The snowmobilers come up in his speeches as people at risk on the roads. In October 2023 he asked who would keep the forest service roads usable for “a rescue operation in the mountains above Canim Lake for a snowmobiler that was injured quite seriously a year ago.” “Might it be the responsibility of that forest company to maintain those roads, make sure that they’re accessible?” he asked. A month later he told the House about a friend: “I have a friend who was hurt quite seriously in a what we refer to as a tank trap, which is a deactivation of a road, where that individual actually had an accident while snowmobiling and trying to access the back country.”^17,18

Those are the words of a man who knows that public access lives or dies on the roads, and that a deactivated road is a closed riding area whatever the map says.

05 The record has gaps: we found no turn in the House where Doerkson raised ATVs, the Off-Road Vehicle Act or trail money. The support the riders describe is local and personal.

We read his turns in the Hansard transcripts of the House and its committee rooms since his election in 2020. We found none in which he raised off-road vehicles, ATVs, side-by-sides, the Off-Road Vehicle Act, Recreation Sites and Trails or the Gold Rush Snowmobile Trail. The only quads in his speeches are stolen ones, in a 2021 statement on crime in Williams Lake.¹⁹

Part of the reason is his job. Since November 2024 he has also served as Assistant Deputy Speaker, a chair role that took him out of the critic’s seat. Most of what the riders credit him with happened at home, in meetings and on the trail, which is where an MLA’s support for a local club usually happens.¹⁵

We also found no letter of support from him for a trail project and no funding announcement in his name. The 108 ATV Club’s trail money has come from the Province’s ORV Trail Fund, $25,000 in 2025 and $25,000 in 2026, under the NDP government he opposes.²⁰

06 Doerkson’s plan would put public access to the backcountry in law. To honour it, he would need to fund the roads and trails that get people there.

On page 46 of the Conservative plan, released on 18 October, Doerkson promises to “guarantee public access to Crown land, beaches and backcountry for all British Columbians in law,” subject only to legitimate conservation and safety requirements. In our view it is the clearest promise on public access that any party has put in a platform, and it is what the riders asked for in 100 Mile House.^21,22

His party told the BC Snowmobile Federation the same thing in its own words. Its official answer expressed support for “responsible backcountry access and opposing unnecessary resource road deactivations and bridge removals,” and committed to working with recreation groups on funding.²³

We looked for the money. In its 71 pages and costing tables we found no line for forest service roads, for Recreation Sites and Trails, the branch that co-manages the Gold Rush trail with the 108 ATV Club, or for Target 8, the Province’s own goal of “a modernized framework for high-value recreation access and resource roads.” The word trail does not appear in the plan. A platform costing is not a budget, so this is not a broken promise. It is a commitment still to be paid for: if Doerkson forms government, he would need to set that money in his first budget to honour it.^21,22,24

A right of access in law is worth what the road and the trail are worth. Redl’s club did more than 60 kilometres of trail work in one year on $36,000, and Redl put the riders’ need in one sentence: “We need money to revitalize our trails.” The plan does not yet say where that money would come from.^7,21

07 The NDP government has met the riders and funded their trails. Its candidate in Cariboo-Chilcotin has no ATV record that we could find.

The fair comparison cuts both ways. The ORV Trail Fund, paid for out of riders’ own ICBC registration fees, put up to $500,000 into 24 projects this year, and Tamara Davidson, the NDP Minister of Environment and Parks, said: “The ORV Trail Fund helps remove financial barriers for communities and volunteer groups that dedicate thousands of hours to maintaining trail networks.” Anderson’s meeting with the riders was, in their words, well received.^13,20,25

But it is the NDP government whose Ministry of Forests is deactivating the road the riders fought over this year, and when the snowmobile federation asked the parties where they stood on access, it reported no official answer from the BC NDP. Kathryn Askew is the NDP candidate in Cariboo-Chilcotin, and Douglas Gook is the Green candidate. We found no public record from either on ATVs, trails or ATVBC, and no ATVBC post about either.^14,23,26

08 In our view, the riders are right about the man. To keep his word, he would need to fund the trails and roads they asked him to keep open.

Doerkson has ridden the trail, sat through the meetings and spoken in the House for the people hurt and stranded on deactivated roads. Redl’s words go further than the record in the Legislature, but they are a fair description of a local MLA who has shown up for the riders for two years.

The riders did not ask for a photograph. They asked, in Redl’s words, for “keeping our backcountry trails open.” That depends on forest service roads staying passable, on the trail branch having money to work with the clubs, and on someone in government owning Target 8. A promise of access in law is the right start, and it is not the whole job.^1,24

The riders call him a supporter, and his record at home bears them out. To honour his commitment, he would need to fund the trails and the roads that reach them.

The four men in front of the banner in 100 Mile House were talking about public access to the backcountry, and so is everyone who rides, sleds, hunts or hikes on a forest service road. Before you vote, ask the candidates on your ballot one question: which minister will own Target 8, and how will it be funded? Final Voting Day is scheduled for Saturday, 24 October.³