September 3, 2024 • 43 mins
Aaron Pete interviews Premier David Eby, discussing his political journey with the BC NDP and key issues like housing affordability, infrastructure, carbon tax, government accountability and addressing the opioid crisis in British Columbia.
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Episode Transcript
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Premier David Eby (00:02):
Politics.
For me, my experience has beenyou think you're going in to do
one job and something elsehappens.
Events take place and thechallenge is maintaining the
focus on why you went, and forme it's always been housing.
Aaron Pete (00:15):
Can you reflect on your journey so far in politics
in BC?
Obviously, housing is a toppriority for so many people.
As housing minister, what youlearned during that time?
How do you process during thatstorm of reaction whether or not
you're on the right track ornot, or whether or not there's
too much political pressure tocontinue?
Premier David Eby (00:31):
There wasn't a single new school built in
Surrey in the last four years ofthe BC Liberal government under
John Rustad and Kevin Falcon.
Recognizing hide a title Forthe first time outside of a
court process for a governmentto do that in British Columbia.
Your message of individualresponsibility is a really
important one, but I think thatgovernment's role is to clear as
much of the path as we can forpeople Having to take that step
(00:53):
back and say we have to take adifferent approach here to
recriminalize public drug usereally difficult and necessary.
Aaron Pete (01:00):
Andrew Weaver wrote a pretty harsh piece on you.
He criticized the health careunder your leadership and your
fiscal policies.
Can you talk a little bit aboutthat?
Today's episode is madepossible in part by support from
Enbridge, fueling quality oflife in British Columbia for
over 65 years.
Premier, it is an honour tospeak with you today.
(01:22):
I'm very grateful you were ableto take the time First.
Would you mind introducingyourself?
Premier David Eby (01:26):
My name is David Eby.
I'm the Premier of BritishColumbia and really glad to be
here.
Thanks for having me.
Aaron Pete (01:30):
It's an honour.
I'm hoping first we can startwith your past work, because I
think it's really important.
A lot of people complain thatpoliticians, they say a lot of
things, but where's the actiongoing to be?
And the action going to be, andyou do, in fact, have a track
record, and so we're able tokind of start with that.
(01:51):
To introduce you to everybody,ndp Premier Glenn Clark once
called you the future of the NDPand by 2018, mclean's described
your role as handling everylive grenade in BC politics.
Can you reflect on your journeyso far in politics in BC?
Premier David Eby (02:00):
Yeah, yeah, sure, absolutely.
It's been um, it's been um verypersonally, uh, challenging and
fulfilling.
It's been, um, the the mostinteresting job I've ever had
and, um, and I hope, uh, lots ofother people get the
opportunity to, to try politicsand to see what it's like.
Um, I think a lot of folks arereluctant to step into politics,
(02:22):
especially these days.
They see, you know some of theharassment online or whatever,
and they think, oh, I couldnever, I don't want to, you know
, but it is a very rewarding andvery interesting job.
Started in opposition, actuallystarted losing you know, I lost
three elections before I waselected for the first time.
And when I was elected for thefirst time, I was in opposition
(02:47):
and it was a great place tolearn.
Opposition is a great place tolearn.
The stakes are a little bitlower and you can kind of find
your way.
And then I was elected togovernment for the first time in
2017.
And the premier at the time,john Horgan, gave me some jobs
that I thought would bechallenging and interesting but
not particularly controversialAttorney General, responsibility
(03:09):
for ICBC and responsibility forthe BC Lottery Corporation and
I have to say I thought theAttorney General role would be
the big and politicallysignificant one, but actually it
was ICBC and BC LotteryCorporation, because the Crown
Corporation that sells us carinsurance was losing a billion
dollars a year, it turned out,and BC Lottery Corporation was
laundering huge amounts of moneythrough casinos and now not the
(03:34):
corporation specifically.
Criminals were doing it, butthey were failing to address it,
and so you know it's beenpolitics for me.
My experience has been youthink you're going in to do one
job and something else happens.
Events take place and thechallenge is maintaining the
focus on why you went, and forme it's always been housing with
(03:54):
addressing the issues of theday, and you know it could be
anything as recently as thecollapse of a tree fruit co-op
in the interior, or a wildfire,or a car insurer that's losing
money.
It's a fascinating job.
Aaron Pete (04:06):
Your father is actually a personal was a
personal injury lawyer, and soI'm just curious did that give
you background understanding ofhow the system worked?
Or did that open your eyes tosome of the opportunities to
kind of improve ICBC?
Or was it really when you kindof took on that file that you
started to understand thecomplexities of the system?
Premier David Eby (04:23):
Yeah, I almost forgot that you and I are
both legally trained.
It's a huge benefit to havelegal training for any aspect of
politics, because it's thelanguage of the legislature and
it's the language of laws andyou can really understand how
the written word of the lawrelates to the policy outcome
you're trying to get.
So if it says you must dosomething or you may do
(04:44):
something, how just that simplechange in the law can make a big
difference in people's livedexperiences of the law in the
community.
So a bit of a sidetrack aboutlaw.
Yeah, my dad was a personalinjury lawyer.
It made it very personal, theICPC stuff, because he was
actually in Ontario when thethen NDP government under Bob
Ray brought in some changes toOntario's car insurance system.
It was like a light no-faultsystem but basically destroyed
(05:09):
his practice and he had torebuild his practice doing other
areas of personal injury law.
And so I understood thesignificance of the changes we
were making at ICBC in terms ofthe people who are working in
law on the personal injury side.
I think it made me a little bitmore sympathetic to the
concerns that were raised bythat side.
But at the same time there werechanges that needed to be made
(05:31):
and they resulted in goodoutcomes for drivers.
Rates were on an unsustainabletrack.
The losses were massive and nowwe have rates that are $500
lower.
They've been frozen for threeyears in a row.
Rebates have been sent back onmultiple occasions and ICBC is
still adding to their bankaccounts to be able to support
injured drivers, pedestrians andothers.
So we're back on track there.
(05:51):
No-transcript pay for it.
Aaron Pete (06:15):
I'm curious that one seems like a good example of
like when you make a decision asa political leader, there's a
storm that can kind of followdecisions or a direction you
choose.
Just being on council for mycommunity, like we're choosing
to tear down this very, very oldbuilding, and then the posts
start to come on social media oflike oh no, they're destroying
a landmark and like we gave theopportunity for people to give
(06:35):
feedback before we took it down.
But you kind of get that andthen you go.
Did I make the right call?
Are we on the right track?
How do you process that?
Because obviously there's ahuge reaction.
Then things start to calm downand now we're all kind of okay,
we're seeing those rebate checks, things are okay now Things are
moving in the right direction.
How do you process during thatstorm of reaction whether or not
you're on the right track ornot, or whether or not there's
too much political pressure tocontinue?
Premier David Eby (06:57):
Yeah, I mean, one of the things that you do
see in politics is there'salways another side.
Even in issues where you thinkit should be pretty cut and
dried and during COVID it's agreat example like whether or
not you should get a vaccine, itfelt to me like a pretty
straightforward oh my God,there's vaccines, let's get
vaccinated.
But there's always another side, and one of the things that
(07:20):
we're really seeing is and someof it's just, you know it's in
your example Anytime you'remaking a change, you're asking
people to trust.
You know we're making a change.
What's coming next is going tobe better and I don't know.
You know I wasn't alive inprevious times in human history,
(07:40):
but it felt like trust was alot higher in institutions and
government and in neighborhoodsand each other, and so this is a
time of limited trust.
So, whether it's tearing down abuilding or whether it's taking
a vaccine, or whether it's anygovernment policy that's going
to change the status quo, peoplehave to trust that you're doing
it for the right reasons, yes,but also that it's going to be a
(08:02):
positive outcome.
And so that's the big challengeof politics, to my mind, and
doing politics well or not isyour ability not just to
communicate where you're going,where you want to go, but that
you're actually able to comeback after you made the change
and say, yeah, we achieved it.
Or earn trust by saying, no, wedidn't, and maybe we could talk
about decrim, but we didn'tachieve what we wanted here, and
(08:25):
so we have to go back and tryagain and to have the humility
to say, yeah, we thought it wasgoing to have this outcome, it
didn't, and we have to keeppushing and changing.
Aaron Pete (08:33):
Agreed and we will definitely get to
decriminalization.
I just want to go a little bitback to your record as housing
minister and what you learnedduring that time.
Premier David Eby (08:41):
Obviously, housing is a top priority for so
many people.
Just reflect on your time thereand what you learned, maybe,
and what are the next steps?
Well, the housing file isreally interesting because the
issues have transitioned over.
I've been in government andpolitics now for a decade and
housing was an issue when itcame into government and it's an
(09:01):
issue today.
In the early days, inopposition, what we were seeing
was international investorscoming in, bidding up housing
prices beyond local incomes, andit's transitioned and it
continues.
Investment-driven housingcontinues to be an issue, but
now one of the biggestchallenges around housing is
population growth.
So we added we're adding about15,000 people every month to the
(09:24):
province of British Columbiaand that's 180,000 people a year
.
It's a good size city, newevery year.
We have to build a huge amountof housing and if we don't, then
people are trying to bid up theexisting housing that we have.
There's just not enough space,and so that shift in the housing
, the causes of the challengeand the policy responses that
(09:46):
are required has been veryinteresting because it seems
like a very straightforward andconsistent issue Housing is too
expensive for people to affordon their incomes.
But the policy responses of whatgovernment should be doing and
how to respond to the challengeswe're facing has changed over
time, has changed over time, andso it's an incredibly complex
(10:11):
issue of everything from zoningrules to interest rates and
financing, to programs andincentives that governments can
put in place, and how we usepublic land and how we use
private land and infrastructureand all these things.
Nobody wants to hear it.
When they can't find a placethat they can rent, that they
can afford to rent, they're justlike where is that place and
how are you going to deliver it?
It's a really hairy problem.
Aaron Pete (10:28):
Agreed, and one of the things I guess I just want
to reflect on is I think it'sreally important that we don't
lose faith, and I don't knowwhere this hopelessness is kind
of being driven from, but Ithink I just bought my first
house, like a couple of weeksago.
Premier David Eby (10:40):
Wow, like a couple of weeks ago.
Wow, congratulations, it was ahuge step but we're very excited
.
Aaron Pete (10:44):
I bet we move in September.
That property transfer tax isgoing to be tough to swallow,
but we've got it all covered andI just I look around at my
peers and go like you need tojust work harder and try harder
and like you need to really pushyourselves.
Like we've been through a lot asCanadians throughout human
history, like we've been througha lot and I think the only
message that I didn't likehearing from so many different
(11:05):
peers and friends was like Idon't know how you're going to
do it, I don't know if it'sgoing to be possible, I don't
know if you should bother.
Maybe it's just a rentersociety now.
And it's like we can rise tothis occasion, like citizens can
rise up and start to take steps, to work hard, try and find
ways to support themselves andgrow into these homes and I know
there's a lot of challenge.
But like that's one of thegreat things to me about being a
Canadian or a British Columbianis like we rise to the occasion
(11:28):
, we step up when we need to andwe do our best to rise up into
those circumstances and I just Iwant there to be more hope in
the atmosphere.
Do you know how we kind ofbring that hope back to people.
Premier David Eby (11:38):
Yeah, aaron, your message of individual
responsibilities are reallyimportant one.
And one of the ways that peoplelose hope is they have that
attitude that you have, like I'mready, I can do it, I'm ready
to go, and then they're foiledby some kind of rule or some
kind of process they have to gothrough or some kind of
requirement that it's completelydeflating.
(12:00):
And then, once you lose thatmomentum, it's really hard to
get it back.
And I'll just give you anexample.
If you're looking at beingcreative and like, how am I
going to be able to afford aplace?
And you're like, okay, well,maybe if I go in with a couple
other friends, we could buy asingle family home and we could
divide it and we could all eachhave our own living space.
(12:21):
And you're like, okay, well,the math works and we figured
out with the credit union howwe're going to do a mortgage and
all these other things.
And then you go to the city andthey say, well, you need to do
a public rezoning process.
It's going to take two years.
It depends on whether or notthe neighbors support a
multi-unit on that site.
And it's like we can't thething that we want to do, that
(12:44):
we can achieve the kind ofhousing in the neighborhood
where we want to be for ourfamily.
You know we can't do it.
It's very like I think thatgovernment's role is to clear as
much of the path as we can forpeople to be able to to leverage
what you're talking about whenyou have the stars aligned in a
way that you're able to takeadvantage of an opportunity and
get into the real estate marketor whatever it is, get that
(13:05):
training, do that new job.
The government's job is toclear the way.
We can't do everything, but wecan clear the way and make it
possible for people to do thesethings.
Aaron Pete (13:15):
The last one on housing is just we at Chihuahua
we've applied to BC Housing forfunds through their Indigenous
Housing Fund.
We're very excited about that.
We're seeing other investmentstake place through BC Housing
and I think affordability is oneof those key pieces where we're
starting to see investments inco-ops or investments in
low-income housing.
Can you talk a little bit aboutthat?
Premier David Eby (13:35):
Yeah, I think one of the things about the
housing challenge that we facein the province and it's not
just us, it's across NorthAmerica and Europe, it's a
conversation around the worldright now is how do we deliver
that affordable housing?
We have to address thespeculation.
We have to address people thatare buying up homes and
converting them into hotel roomsthrough Airbnb or leaving them
vacant as investments and allthose other pieces.
(13:56):
We have to be building morehousing by addressing those
zoning rules I was talking aboutand making it easier and faster
to build the housing we need.
We have to directly fund moreaffordable housing as government
to bring down some of thebarriers for people that can't
afford other types of housing.
We have to use public land moreeffectively by building housing
on it that's actuallyaffordable and attainable for
middle-income people.
(14:16):
We need to do all of thesethings.
We need to do everything thatis possible in every program,
and the thing that is surprisingto me is, in the housing
discussion we're havingpolitically is I hear from the
other parties well, we're notgoing to do this and we're not
going to do that.
We're not going to restrictAirbnbs, we're not going to do
the speculation vacancy tax.
We're not going to allowmultiple units on a single
family lot.
Well, how can you respond to acrisis when it's a?
(14:38):
It's an emergency and I thinkhousing is actually an emergency
that you have to do all thethings.
And so we're doing all thethings and that's the commitment
, and that includes, as you'rementioning, co-ops.
It includes the provincefunding housing on reserve,
which is something that theprovince has never done before.
Because we need to do it.
We just recognize that it hasto be done.
Aaron Pete (15:00):
We have to do all of the things and we're going to
Well, just to comment verybriefly to wrap up this
discussion on housing.
I'm incredibly grateful we putthis application in, but
explaining the BC housingopportunity in comparison to
CMHC and Indigenous ServicesCanada is far better because the
challenge when I joined andtook over the housing portfolio
(15:20):
is we had 89 homes.
None of them had ever beenmaintained, invested in, there
was mold in all of them and Ilost a patch of my hair trying
to address this issue out offear of like people live here.
I would not live here, I wouldnot be willing to be in this
circumstance, so it'sunacceptable.
So we took Christmas off, wepushed forward, I kept doing
applications and trying toprepare, but we'd never had a
(15:41):
clear process.
Like a lot of people don't knowthat we're responsible for
basically the rent, landlord,maintenance of community and
like all of their homes, and wedon't have real big resources to
pull on.
And now we're seeing investmentsfrom the federal government.
But this opportunity to besupported in this housing
investments is is incomparableto any other program because it
(16:02):
puts us in the position to workwith the third party operator to
make sure that people maintaintheir homes, pay their rent on
time and then we actually get tomake sure that it's a quality
place to live for 40 years,rather than building a two-story
place and then not maintainingit for 40 years and looking and
going oh no, look at the housingon reserve, it doesn't look
good.
Like this is a real, solvableissue and like I believe that
(16:22):
the investments the provincialgovernment has made is allowing
indigenous communities to havehousing that's of quality that
people can be proud of, becauseit's not fee simple land.
It's not treated in the sameway, so it's very difficult to
get investments in thosecommunities and I'm just very
grateful for the process thattook place in the quality of
(16:43):
lives.
Premier David Eby (16:44):
I'm really glad to hear that.
I have to admit, when I firstheard the proposal and it was
when John was Premier I was likewhy are we as the province
doing this?
The federal government shouldbe doing this.
It's their responsibilitysquarely.
But the more that I was exposedto the reality that it's just
not going to happen Like if wejust wait for the feds, it's
just not going to happen Then itwas pretty obvious that this
(17:07):
was the right direction.
And to see the results now, asyou say, see these places open
up, people move in it's reallyquite moving and amazing how it
can be transformative in acommunity especially, you know,
a lot of the communities arequite small.
So if you have a 30 unitbuilding or a 20 unit building,
it can be just a massive changein the community.
Aaron Pete (17:25):
That's actually quality right, Like we actually
get to bring in an architect.
They're designing it, they'remaking sure it's top quality.
We're not cheaping out onanything like that.
That's just something mycommunity has never seen, so I'm
super grateful for that Awesome.
The next conversation is fiscalmanagement and credit rating
downgrades.
Under leadership, we've seencredit rating downgrades.
Would you mind talking aboutthat?
Premier David Eby (17:46):
Yeah, we had.
So there are three major creditrating agencies for the
province of BC and one of themdowngraded us and the main
reason given by the agency wasconcern about our capital
expenditure.
So that's capital expenditureis the money that's spent on
(18:07):
building up the province roads,schools, hospitals, housing, the
physical things, not theservices and we have a massive
capital budget.
I'm going to make anannouncement today, actually,
actually about Highway 1, rightout near Abbotsford, and the
reason why we're putting so muchmoney into capital and I think
(18:29):
we're doing it in a responsibleway.
Our debt-to-GDP ratio, which isthe traditional measurement of
whether your debt's sustainableor not, is one of the lowest in
Canada and we continue to bevery careful about managing that
, and we continue to be verycareful about managing that.
But the reason why we'rebuilding up this infrastructure
in the province is because ofthe growth that we're seeing,
the number of people.
So Fraser Valley, where we areright now, has seen a massive
(18:52):
influx of people.
The schools are bursting at theseams because people are
choosing to move here and we doneed those folks to come to help
build the future of BritishColumbia.
But if we don't address thefact that the schools are full,
that the hospitals are full,that the roads are crowded with
traffic.
By building transit, byexpanding the roads, by building
the schools and hospitals, theresulting downgrade in the
(19:15):
quality of life for our provincewill have knock-on effects in
the private sector.
You won't be able to recruitthe employees you need.
You won't be able to ensurethat the employees that you have
decide to stay because theschools aren't good and the
hospital is not good and I'msitting in traffic.
I'm going to go somewhere else.
People are globally mobile rightnow, and so this is a time
where we take the money, we dothe building and we pay it off
(19:38):
over generations, just like ourgrandparents did.
That's the infrastructure thatwe're using right now.
We're using our grandparents'infrastructure and there was a
long period where governmentsaid we're not gonna put the
money into that.
There wasn't a single newschool built in Surrey in the
last four years of the BCLiberal government under John
Rustad and Kevin Falconsimilarly underfunded that
critical infrastructure, and sowe need to build those schools
(19:59):
and it's just not negotiable inmy mind.
We just have to do it and, likea mortgage, you got to borrow
it up front and you pay it offover the lifetime of the
infrastructure.
Aaron Pete (20:06):
Brilliant Reconciliation.
Can you talk to us about theHaida Gwaii title agreement, the
changes to the Land Act andwhat's taking place there?
Premier David Eby (20:16):
Yeah, this was.
Have you ever been to HaidaGwaii?
No, it's amazing.
I went for my first time thisyear and it was really quite an
amazing place 80% Indigenouspopulation, no overlapping
claims from other nations, 20years of Haida governance on
Haida Gwaii and a process thatstarted after Gordon Campbell
(20:41):
had his realization that hecouldn't fight Indigenous title,
that he had to accept that thiswas a reality, going forward,
new relationship work that theydid, continuing that work to its
culmination of recognizingHaida title For the first time,
outside of a court process, fora government to do that in
British Columbia.
Title's been recognized in BC,but only through a decade of
(21:04):
litigation or through discretetreaty negotiations, and so this
is a new way of doing things.
It is a choice.
The choice is can we recognizethe rights that are here, the
rights and title that are here,that we know that a court is
(21:25):
gonna recognize it's veryobvious or do we battle it out
in courts for a decade, payinglawyers a bunch of money no
offense to us as lawyers, right,but paying lawyers a bunch of
money and then coming out theother end with the same result,
except it's been decided fromthe bench and it hasn't been
negotiated between governments.
How are we gonna do this?
And we've seen both models Inthe Silcotin 10 years in court
(21:47):
crashing into title recognitionof the Supreme Court of Canada.
It created a huge uncertainty onthe land Haida Gwaii decades of
negotiation, work, partnershipand resulting in the title
declaration for Haida GwaiiBusinesses, local governments,
haida standing together sayingthis is the right direction.
We're all working together ForSilcotin.
(22:08):
We're still seeing thoseconflicts that went through the
court process and so we justthink it's a much preferable way
of doing things and I'm reallyexcited about that
reconciliation work that we'redoing.
Aaron Pete (22:18):
I agree I think it's one of the leading areas.
Looking at all the differentreconciliation agreements, I
look at Stahelis' and thinkabout that.
For my own community of like,how do we move forward in a good
way and how do we take on moreresponsibility so we can start
to contribute to the economy andkind of share our culture and
language and values in a waywhere it lifts everybody up?
The other piece I'd like totalk about is Métis people as
(22:39):
well.
I work at Métis Nation, BC andget to kind of understand their
culture and their language andtheir values and one of the
areas is the distinctions-basedapproach and I'm just curious if
you could reflect on that andthe role perhaps First Nations
Leadership Council can play inkind of.
I feel like the two are at oddswith each other and perhaps
that's being inflamed in someways.
(23:00):
Would you mind reflecting onthat?
Premier David Eby (23:02):
Yeah, it's a challenge and it's something
I've only really learned aboutthrough my work in government
about the relationship betweenMétis people and British
Columbia and First Nations.
The anxiety, as I understand itfrom nations and it's best to
hear from them directly, but asit's been explained to me is
ensuring that Métis people'srights are recognized, while
(23:26):
recognizing that they're notland-based rights, that the
land-based rights are FirstNations rights and that Métis
people deserve the recognitionaround education and other
services to make sure they'reresponsive to the needs of Métis
people, but that when ittransitions over into land
rights, that's when the nationsstart to get really anxious,
because the nation'sunderstanding is, of course,
(23:48):
that those land rights come frompossession of the land at a
certain period of time under theconstitution, and so that's
where the tension comes in.
Anytime it looks like there areland rights discussions being
had or recognitions like that, Ithink that we're really getting
to a place where there'sbroader understanding within
government about that.
There will continue to betensions, but I've noticed
(24:12):
recently that some of thattemperature is coming down.
We have been working with MétisNation BC on a Métis justice
strategy, the First Nationsjustice strategy.
They're broadly complementarybut they're separate and around
education, similar kinds ofthings, and so finding those
paths to be able to supportMétis people in the province in
the way that they want to besupported and partnered with,
(24:36):
and the same for First Nationsin the province, while
recognizing those criticaldifferences, is really important
, I think, to both groups.
And all of these things are alearning process.
They don't just happenovernight and they come through
experience and working together.
Aaron Pete (24:56):
The next question I have is around the carbon tax.
We're in somewhat of a uniquecircumstance and compared to
other provinces, Would you mindreflecting on that and where
that's sort of gone?
I've spoken to Kevin Falcon whotalked about it being revenue
neutral and he discussed howthat changed under the NDP
leadership.
Would you mind talking aboutthe carbon tax and what your
perspectives are on?
Premier David Eby (25:15):
it?
Yeah, sure.
So the carbon tax wasintroduced in BC under Kevin
Falcon and John Rustad I thoughtthey would never.
You know, they're extremelyreluctant to admit that publicly
and it wasn't revenue neutral.
Government collected that taxand then said it was neutral
because it helped pay for taxcredits that already existed,
for example for the film andtelevision industry.
(25:35):
This was something Mr Falcondid.
So those things aren't correct.
But the situation is currentlywith the carbon taxes.
The federal government has saidyou must charge a certain price
for carbon in your province andso, regardless of what your
provincial government is,everybody is doing that across
Canada right now because that'sthe federal law and there's a
lot of discussion about.
(25:56):
Well, people don't like it atdifferent provinces and all
these different pieces, but theyhave to do it.
It's the federal law and so ifthe federal government changes
that policy, then we'll have alook at how we're doing things
right now.
Changes that policy, then we'llhave a look at how we're doing
things right now.
But in BC, with that carbonprice that the feds require us
(26:16):
to charge, we're ensuring thatthe increase that they imposed
on British Columbians isreturned 100% actually more than
100% back to British Columbiansas best we can and we're using
the existing carbon tax revenuesthat we have to invest in
things like transit, drivingdown emissions and actually
reducing emissions.
And it's how we've been able toreduce emissions despite
dramatic population growth inthe province, which is something
that's important to a lot ofBritish Columbians, and we see
the smoky summers and theextreme heat dome kind of
(26:39):
activities in this province inways they're just starting to
see across Canada.
British Columbians want to knowthat we're addressing the
emissions but also that we'releveraging our benefits to grow
the economy, because we got hugeassets here that help us grow a
low carbon economy, cheapelectricity being the main one,
and our timber supply and ourmass timber industry.
(27:01):
So there are lots of economicopportunities for us in this as
well, and we're trying to tieall those pieces together and
we're seeing the results of agrowing economy and reducing
emissions.
The thing that I don'tunderstand is how in today's day
and age you know John RossStead is the leader of the
conservative says you know Idon't believe in human caused
(27:21):
climate change, it's a hoax andthat if he's elected he'll ban
climate science materials fromclassrooms and he wants to be
the premier of British Columbia.
I mean it's bizarre becausehe's going to miss the economic
opportunity that our kidsdeserve of building a low-carbon
economy.
Because that's where the worldis going, that's where Europe's
going, asia's going and theUnited States hopefully
continues to go.
But also we'll fail to take thenecessary actions to protect
(27:44):
our kids too.
Aaron Pete (27:46):
The other piece I wanted to ask about and this one
.
It doesn't get as much coverage, but it's something that my
communities personally thoughtabout and experienced is
contaminated soil being moved onto First Nation communities and
different areas.
Like I know, some people up inColumbia Valley are dealing with
contaminated soil because, if Iunderstand this correctly, it's
cheaper for them to kind ofconvince a person on their CP
(28:08):
land to kind of move soil ontotheir land and say, hey, we'll
give you $500,000, knowing thatthe cost to actually deal with
it is far greater.
So it's actually worth the cost.
And then they disappear and allthe forms were kind of forged
and they're gone and then we'releft holding the bill and we're
trying to figure out what to do.
And I've heard this withnumerous different First Nation
communities.
I've heard about it withColumbia Valley.
(28:28):
I'm just wondering if you haveany perspectives on how we go
about addressing that, becauseit seems like the incentive is
easier to do it thisinappropriate way, because
there's not enoughaccountability there to kind of
prevent them from impactingriverways and waterways and
freshwater and all of thosethings.
Have you thought about thisissue or heard about it?
Premier David Eby (28:45):
Yes, I have.
Yeah, so there's a couple ofpieces.
One is just fill, generally Onfarming government, we changed a
number of rules around theagricultural land reserve where
just fill was being dumped onfarmland, making it unsuitable
for farming, and there wereinsufficient rules to protect
around that.
And then when there'scontamination, it's another
level.
So we've had to revisit how wedo enforcement because there are
(29:06):
people who have receivedmultiple notices of infraction
and fines and appear to be doingthe math that it's better to
just continue to operate inviolation of the law and pay the
fees and the fines rather thanstop doing what they're doing.
So we've had to go to court toget injunctions and we always
(29:30):
struggle a little bit with thejurisdictional differences when
it comes to reserve land andenforcement on a whole bunch of
different issues.
But even just on straight upprovincial land, we've had to
revisit how we do enforcementbecause these people are highly
motivated.
Because these people are highlymotivated, as you say, there's
a lot of money to be made indumping the soil and where
(29:52):
there's kind of a willingpartnership to evade provincial
restrictions, like I'll take thecontaminated dirt and I won't
say anything.
If you don't say anything, youpay me the right amount of money
.
It can be hard whether or notit's reserve or not reserve land
.
No-transcript for reserve land.
(30:13):
You know the Ministry ofAgriculture and the Ministry of
Water, lands and NaturalResources will keep doing that
work, and Ministry ofEnvironment, of course.
Aaron Pete (30:21):
Interesting Healthcare.
Yeah, andrew Weaver wrote apretty harsh piece on you.
I don't know if you had theopportunity to see it.
Premier David Eby (30:28):
No, I haven't .
Aaron Pete (30:29):
Okay, he criticized the healthcare under your
leadership and your fiscalpolicies and I'm wondering if
you can just reflect.
Of course, your two governmentsat one point in time worked
together and then he wrote thispiece and I'm just curious how
you think about those issues.
Premier David Eby (30:43):
Well, yeah, healthcare is the number one
issue, I would say, for manypremiers across Canada.
It's certainly in our topissues here in British Columbia,
and it's a consistent issue,which is we've had a cohort of
healthcare workers retire fromthe system, especially after
COVID, in large numbers, andwe're also seeing massive
population growth across thecountry, so we see increased
(31:05):
demand for healthcare, and sothe response from the provincial
government has been three parts.
One is we're going to trainmore healthcare workers, new
spaces for doctors and nurses.
We're opening a new medicalschool Recognizing the
international credentials thatpeople are already trained.
They're in British Columbia,they're ready to work, but there
are barriers to them practicingin BC.
And the third is making surethat infrastructure's in place
(31:27):
for them to be able to practice.
The physical spaces, thehospitals in this province are
falling apart, so we're buildingnew hospitals 13 newer,
expanded hospitals right acrossthe province and that also
serves as a way to bring indoctors and nurses because they
come into these beautiful newfacilities.
It costs a lot of money, fiscalmanagement.
(31:48):
These are deliberate decisionsthat governments made to open a
new medical school.
That costs money too.
We've reached a new deal withthe family doctors 300,000 more
British Colombians have familydoctors now than they did before
.
I was sworn in as premier andwe reached that deal, and so
we're making progress on theseissues 7,000 new nurses, 700 new
family doctors, and so we'returning the corner on these
(32:12):
issues, except the critique.
It's not acceptable.
It shouldn't be tolerated thatpeople can't access a family
doctor, that there's a bypass ontheir emergency room or the
emergency room is closed, andthese are issues that are faced
across Canada.
The way we're attacking thisissue is different in British
Columbia, because people deserveaccess to high quality care,
and you're not going to getthere by cutting the healthcare
system, and I guess this will bepart of the discussion.
(32:32):
I can't believe it, but it'llbe part of the discussion.
In the election, john Rostadreleased his healthcare plan, a
suggestion he's going to cut$4.1 billion from our healthcare
system.
Kevin Falcon yesterdayannounced that he's going to
have an unfunded $5 billion taxcut and balance the budget
within a year.
Plus $10 billion has got tocome from somewhere, so he's
going to be cutting healthcaretoo.
(32:52):
The results will only get worse.
People have longer waits forsurgeries.
I don't know how you hirenurses if you're cutting $10
billion from the provincialbudget, and that's what we
desperately need.
Aaron Pete (33:02):
Right.
The one area that has receiveda lot of feedback from me when I
said I had the opportunity tospeak with you is this COVID-19
requirements in healthcareworkers.
Would you mind talking aboutthe decision to change those
rules?
Was it a little bit late?
What are your thoughts on thatto change?
Premier David Eby (33:17):
those rules?
Was it a little bit late?
What are your thoughts on that?
So the provincial healthofficer, bonnie Henry who, by
the way, on COVID, I think hadremarkable results saving lives
responding to the pandemicdeclared the health emergency
over.
Of course the pandemic is overfor COVID, at least in the daily
experiences of most BritishColombians, and the result of
(33:38):
that, the emergency measuresrelated to healthcare workers
expired as well.
We decided not to put aprovincial requirement in that
extended those emergencyrequirements around vaccination
after she ended the emergencyand instead have decided to look
at things like measles, mumps,rubella, covid flu, all these
(34:01):
other types of infectiousdiseases, to require all
healthcare workers to declaretheir vaccination status.
And if there is an outbreak ina facility, the workers who are
unvaccinated can be pulled.
So if there's a measlesoutbreak, we don't have the
unvaccinated workers in thepediatric wards where kids can
die from measles.
They're pulled off the scheduleand they're not working, and so
it's a broader approach tovaccination.
(34:22):
The COVID approach was veryspecific to one disease, but it
felt a little strange to be likeyou must be vaccinated for
COVID, but we don't haveanything to say about the fact
that you're not vaccinated formeasles.
Aaron Pete (34:33):
Do you have any reflections or regrets?
I just I can't imagine yourrole.
Like I think about my community650 members.
I try and keep myselfaccountable to them.
When I ran, I really tried torun on a platform and making
clear what I was going to do,and then I've tried to follow
through on those things, eventhough many First Nation
communities.
One of the things we strugglewith is we vote people based on
(34:53):
last name and not always basedon who has the best ideas or
who's actually following throughon their track record.
I think about my role and thenI think about your
responsibilities and I just thatfeels like a lot of pressure.
I feel like I'm under a lot ofpressure, but yours is at a
higher magnitude, and then youhave to make decisions.
Do you have any regrets or waysyou process the decisions that
you've made throughout yourcareer?
Premier David Eby (35:15):
Yeah, let me just start by saying the first
race I ran that I lost was arace for local government.
I'm very grateful that I lostbecause I actually think when
you're working in a smallcommunity and you're the elected
representative of, in your case, just over 600 people, you're
accountable and available in afrontline way that at the
(35:35):
provincial level and the federallevel especially, you're more
insulated from School boardtrustees, city councilors,
mayors and others, first Nationscouncil members and chairs,
chiefs they're all moreimmediately accountable in the
community.
So I wouldn't understate thenature of the pressure that you
(35:57):
face compared to the provincialgovernment.
There are always things and Iimagine you've run into a
similar situation there arealways things that you would do
differently in hindsight.
That's the amazing and awesomepower of hindsight.
All you can do is, when youmake a decision and you go
forward and it's not working outthe way that you want and it's
(36:19):
not having the results you want,maybe it's having the complete
opposite of the results that youwant you have to have the
humility and the willingness tosay this didn't work and here
are the reasons it didn't work.
And, um, we're going to go inthis different direction and I
think that that for me, if Ican't do that and get reelected,
(36:39):
then it's just who.
I am right.
We're here to solve problems,not to be ideological about it,
to force through and say, oh,just wait a few more, it's going
to keep working.
We need to be able to say no,we're going to try something
different, and I think that thatactually is something that will
rebuild trust in government forpeople is if elected officials
(37:02):
are willing to say yeah, youknow, like we used to pick up
the newspaper and kind of agreeon the issues and now it feels
like more and more people havesub issues and they have
(37:23):
different perspectives oneverything, and I think it's so
important that we just keepthings about the issues and how
we can kind of go aboutaddressing them.
Aaron Pete (37:30):
Do you have any examples of things you might've
done differently or kind of thatyou look back on and go if I
had a chance to do that overagain, or maybe you're already
doing some of those things.
Premier David Eby (37:38):
Yeah, just to pick up on your comment, then
I'll give you some examples.
I actually think it's a sign ofstrength and not a sign of
weakness to be able to say itdidn't work, we're going to try
something else.
And, to be frank, in that way,and there is a culture and a
sort of understanding ofpolitics right now that's like
you never apologize, you neveradmit that you were going in the
wrong direction.
(37:58):
You never and you always insistthat it was the right thing to
do.
And we can see it in a lot ofdifferent examples, but the one
that and we talked about alittle bit earlier, but the one
that definitely jumps to mind isdecriminalization.
You know, here's a scenariowhere we're working with the
police and they're supportive ofour approach.
The advocates are supportive ofour approach.
(38:20):
Public health people aresupportive of our approach.
We say and I am supportive.
I have been a drug prosecutor.
I prosecuted a young indigenouswoman.
It was one of the mosttraumatic experiences of my life
.
I wasn't even on the stand, Iwas the prosecutor and I saw
that this wouldn't change herlife at all and that this whole
courthouse had been arrayedagainst her, that I was getting
paid, her lawyer was gettingpaid, the judge was getting paid
(38:42):
, the sheriff was getting paid,everyone was looked after except
for her, and she wasimmediately released.
I was a junior prosecutor.
It was a minor violation and soshe didn't go to jail or
anything.
There was no consequence andshe left worse off, less
trustful of the system.
And so when the suggestion cameforward, like why don't we move
away from this model of usingthe criminal law around people
(39:04):
who are addicted?
Why don't we move to this modelof where instead we're focused
on treatment and we use themoney around prosecuting and all
this other stuff to focus ontreatment, get people in
treatment and get away and thenreduce some of the stigma around
using?
And the outcome was in manyways heartbreaking for me
(39:24):
because you know, it's such afirm understanding that the
criminal justice system is notsuited to address addiction and
I still strongly believe that.
But to see that you know peoplestruggling so hardcore with
addiction that, in the absenceof criminalization, that they're
using on the bus, that they'reusing at the Tim Hortons,
they're using at the hospital,they're using in the middle of
(39:46):
the public park where the kidsare nearby, because the only
thing that's driving them in themoment is the addiction and the
police saying because youremoved our ability to arrest
and move people and seize drugsand so on through
decriminalization, we don't havea tool to address this anymore,
having to take that step backand say, okay, that was not the
result, that was never theintention that we wanted.
(40:07):
We have to take a differentapproach here to recriminalize
public drug use Really difficultand necessary and I think, also
hopefully a measure and a stepto increase trust in the public
like, okay, we do understandwhere you're trying to go, we'll
give you the rope to be able totry different things, but we
(40:28):
want to know that if it's notworking out the way that you
wanted, that you're going to fixit and you're going to go in a
different direction.
And so I hope that's whatpeople are saying and that's
what I'm sure we'll be talkingabout in the election as well.
Aaron Pete (40:36):
Yeah, I was a native court worker for five years and
I had the privilege of workingwith so many different clients
and I do think that investmentsin recovery and treatment are so
important.
I'd have to send people, inorder for them to get bail, into
recovery homes where we knewthat the person running the home
was struggling with drug usethemselves, and then I'd have to
bring the person back and go.
Well, they weren't successful.
(40:57):
They ended up doing drugs again.
But it was because of thesekind of outlying issues that,
like we don't control who'srunning these homes, they're
making minimum wage and theykind of promote people up with
from within, and so it's notalways effective.
But I will say, like I knowthat the court system isn't
always the best place, but Ihave seen such a beauty in how
people have approachedreconciliation since working
(41:19):
with Crown Council, working withjudges.
I think they really dounderstand the Gladue decision.
I think they understand that weneed to support people in a
better way.
We just need those wraparoundresources to help people stay on
the right track.
But, like one of my favoritestories and then we can start to
wrap up here is just thisindividual came in.
They were struggling theirwhole lives.
They had been sexually abusedsince a child.
(41:39):
I walked through their storyand their experiences that they
had told me.
I presented that to the crownand to the judge and told their
story, and the judge was justable to look at the person and
say, hey, like I know, you'vebeen through horrible things,
that, like we wouldn't worsewish on our worst enemy and like
I am so sorry and I amacknowledging the things you've
been through, but I want you togo reach your full potential,
(42:00):
because you're capable of somuch more.
You're a smart person.
You deserve better than thislife.
And that was incredibly moving,and it's not always a great
place to do things in the courtsystem, but there is something
about that person sitting upthere in a robe, being able to
validate the things that you'vebeen through that were wrong,
disgusting and horrible, andhave that kind of authority
figure, give life to your storyand respect it and then want you
(42:22):
to go into a better direction.
And so I do just think thepeople in that system are so
much more amazing than Iimagined.
When I was in my undergraduatedegree and we talked about
systemic racism, I was sort ofimagining that there was going
to be a person being like whocares about these people, and
then just seeing all thesepeople want the best is
something that gives me realhope as we go into the future.
But would you mind tellingpeople how they can follow your
(42:42):
campaign, follow your work, sothey can stay informed about the
issues?
Premier David Eby (42:46):
Yeah, sure, I'm pretty easy to track down.
You can follow me on all thethings.
I'm on Twitter at Daveunderscore EB, I'm on Facebook,
instagram and I'm a Googlesearch away.
Aaron Pete (43:00):
Okay, brilliant.
I appreciate you being willingto take the time to have this
conversation.
I love that we got to do a longform conversation.
It wasn't three minutes.
We were able to really get intosome of these issues and I find
that admirable for you to putyourself out.
You didn't exactly know what wewere going to be discussing
today, but you trusted theprocess and I just really
appreciate the opportunity tokind of dive into these things.
I felt like you were reallytransparent and willing to kind
(43:20):
of dive into the tough topics.
So thank you so much for comingout today.
Premier David Eby (43:23):
Yeah, thanks for having me, Aaron.
It was a great show, andcongratulations on your work
here too.
Thank you.
Aaron Pete (43:28):
Today's episode is made possible in part by support
from Enbridge, fueling qualityof life in British Columbia for
over 65 years.
Politics.
For me, my experience has beenyou think you're going in to do
one job and something elsehappens.
Events take place and thechallenge is maintaining the
focus on why you went, and forme it's always been housing.
Aaron Pete (00:15):
Can you reflect on your journey so far in politics
in BC?
Obviously, housing is a toppriority for so many people.
As housing minister, what youlearned during that time?
How do you process during thatstorm of reaction whether or not
you're on the right track ornot, or whether or not there's
too much political pressure tocontinue?
Premier David Eby (00:31):
There wasn't a single new school built in
Surrey in the last four years ofthe BC Liberal government under
John Rustad and Kevin Falcon.
Recognizing hide a title Forthe first time outside of a
court process for a governmentto do that in British Columbia.
Your message of individualresponsibility is a really
important one, but I think thatgovernment's role is to clear as
much of the path as we can forpeople Having to take that step
(00:53):
back and say we have to take adifferent approach here to
recriminalize public drug usereally difficult and necessary.
Aaron Pete (01:00):
Andrew Weaver wrote a pretty harsh piece on you.
He criticized the health careunder your leadership and your
fiscal policies.
Can you talk a little bit aboutthat?
Today's episode is madepossible in part by support from
Enbridge, fueling quality oflife in British Columbia for
over 65 years.
Premier, it is an honour tospeak with you today.
(01:22):
I'm very grateful you were ableto take the time First.
Would you mind introducingyourself?
Premier David Eby (01:26):
My name is David Eby.
I'm the Premier of BritishColumbia and really glad to be
here.
Thanks for having me.
Aaron Pete (01:30):
It's an honour.
I'm hoping first we can startwith your past work, because I
think it's really important.
A lot of people complain thatpoliticians, they say a lot of
things, but where's the actiongoing to be?
And the action going to be, andyou do, in fact, have a track
record, and so we're able tokind of start with that.
(01:51):
To introduce you to everybody,ndp Premier Glenn Clark once
called you the future of the NDPand by 2018, mclean's described
your role as handling everylive grenade in BC politics.
Can you reflect on your journeyso far in politics in BC?
Premier David Eby (02:00):
Yeah, yeah, sure, absolutely.
It's been um, it's been um verypersonally, uh, challenging and
fulfilling.
It's been, um, the the mostinteresting job I've ever had
and, um, and I hope, uh, lots ofother people get the
opportunity to, to try politicsand to see what it's like.
Um, I think a lot of folks arereluctant to step into politics,
(02:22):
especially these days.
They see, you know some of theharassment online or whatever,
and they think, oh, I couldnever, I don't want to, you know
, but it is a very rewarding andvery interesting job.
Started in opposition, actuallystarted losing you know, I lost
three elections before I waselected for the first time.
And when I was elected for thefirst time, I was in opposition
(02:47):
and it was a great place tolearn.
Opposition is a great place tolearn.
The stakes are a little bitlower and you can kind of find
your way.
And then I was elected togovernment for the first time in
2017.
And the premier at the time,john Horgan, gave me some jobs
that I thought would bechallenging and interesting but
not particularly controversialAttorney General, responsibility
(03:09):
for ICBC and responsibility forthe BC Lottery Corporation and
I have to say I thought theAttorney General role would be
the big and politicallysignificant one, but actually it
was ICBC and BC LotteryCorporation, because the Crown
Corporation that sells us carinsurance was losing a billion
dollars a year, it turned out,and BC Lottery Corporation was
laundering huge amounts of moneythrough casinos and now not the
(03:34):
corporation specifically.
Criminals were doing it, butthey were failing to address it,
and so you know it's beenpolitics for me.
My experience has been youthink you're going in to do one
job and something else happens.
Events take place and thechallenge is maintaining the
focus on why you went, and forme it's always been housing with
(03:54):
addressing the issues of theday, and you know it could be
anything as recently as thecollapse of a tree fruit co-op
in the interior, or a wildfire,or a car insurer that's losing
money.
It's a fascinating job.
Aaron Pete (04:06):
Your father is actually a personal was a
personal injury lawyer, and soI'm just curious did that give
you background understanding ofhow the system worked?
Or did that open your eyes tosome of the opportunities to
kind of improve ICBC?
Or was it really when you kindof took on that file that you
started to understand thecomplexities of the system?
Premier David Eby (04:23):
Yeah, I almost forgot that you and I are
both legally trained.
It's a huge benefit to havelegal training for any aspect of
politics, because it's thelanguage of the legislature and
it's the language of laws andyou can really understand how
the written word of the lawrelates to the policy outcome
you're trying to get.
So if it says you must dosomething or you may do
(04:44):
something, how just that simplechange in the law can make a big
difference in people's livedexperiences of the law in the
community.
So a bit of a sidetrack aboutlaw.
Yeah, my dad was a personalinjury lawyer.
It made it very personal, theICPC stuff, because he was
actually in Ontario when thethen NDP government under Bob
Ray brought in some changes toOntario's car insurance system.
It was like a light no-faultsystem but basically destroyed
(05:09):
his practice and he had torebuild his practice doing other
areas of personal injury law.
And so I understood thesignificance of the changes we
were making at ICBC in terms ofthe people who are working in
law on the personal injury side.
I think it made me a little bitmore sympathetic to the
concerns that were raised bythat side.
But at the same time there werechanges that needed to be made
(05:31):
and they resulted in goodoutcomes for drivers.
Rates were on an unsustainabletrack.
The losses were massive and nowwe have rates that are $500
lower.
They've been frozen for threeyears in a row.
Rebates have been sent back onmultiple occasions and ICBC is
still adding to their bankaccounts to be able to support
injured drivers, pedestrians andothers.
So we're back on track there.
(05:51):
No-transcript pay for it.
Aaron Pete (06:15):
I'm curious that one seems like a good example of
like when you make a decision asa political leader, there's a
storm that can kind of followdecisions or a direction you
choose.
Just being on council for mycommunity, like we're choosing
to tear down this very, very oldbuilding, and then the posts
start to come on social media oflike oh no, they're destroying
a landmark and like we gave theopportunity for people to give
(06:35):
feedback before we took it down.
But you kind of get that andthen you go.
Did I make the right call?
Are we on the right track?
How do you process that?
Because obviously there's ahuge reaction.
Then things start to calm downand now we're all kind of okay,
we're seeing those rebate checks, things are okay now Things are
moving in the right direction.
How do you process during thatstorm of reaction whether or not
you're on the right track ornot, or whether or not there's
too much political pressure tocontinue?
Premier David Eby (06:57):
Yeah, I mean, one of the things that you do
see in politics is there'salways another side.
Even in issues where you thinkit should be pretty cut and
dried and during COVID it's agreat example like whether or
not you should get a vaccine, itfelt to me like a pretty
straightforward oh my God,there's vaccines, let's get
vaccinated.
But there's always another side, and one of the things that
(07:20):
we're really seeing is and someof it's just, you know it's in
your example Anytime you'remaking a change, you're asking
people to trust.
You know we're making a change.
What's coming next is going tobe better and I don't know.
You know I wasn't alive inprevious times in human history,
(07:40):
but it felt like trust was alot higher in institutions and
government and in neighborhoodsand each other, and so this is a
time of limited trust.
So, whether it's tearing down abuilding or whether it's taking
a vaccine, or whether it's anygovernment policy that's going
to change the status quo, peoplehave to trust that you're doing
it for the right reasons, yes,but also that it's going to be a
(08:02):
positive outcome.
And so that's the big challengeof politics, to my mind, and
doing politics well or not isyour ability not just to
communicate where you're going,where you want to go, but that
you're actually able to comeback after you made the change
and say, yeah, we achieved it.
Or earn trust by saying, no, wedidn't, and maybe we could talk
about decrim, but we didn'tachieve what we wanted here, and
(08:25):
so we have to go back and tryagain and to have the humility
to say, yeah, we thought it wasgoing to have this outcome, it
didn't, and we have to keeppushing and changing.
Aaron Pete (08:33):
Agreed and we will definitely get to
decriminalization.
I just want to go a little bitback to your record as housing
minister and what you learnedduring that time.
Premier David Eby (08:41):
Obviously, housing is a top priority for so
many people.
Just reflect on your time thereand what you learned, maybe,
and what are the next steps?
Well, the housing file isreally interesting because the
issues have transitioned over.
I've been in government andpolitics now for a decade and
housing was an issue when itcame into government and it's an
(09:01):
issue today.
In the early days, inopposition, what we were seeing
was international investorscoming in, bidding up housing
prices beyond local incomes, andit's transitioned and it
continues.
Investment-driven housingcontinues to be an issue, but
now one of the biggestchallenges around housing is
population growth.
So we added we're adding about15,000 people every month to the
(09:24):
province of British Columbiaand that's 180,000 people a year
.
It's a good size city, newevery year.
We have to build a huge amountof housing and if we don't, then
people are trying to bid up theexisting housing that we have.
There's just not enough space,and so that shift in the housing
, the causes of the challengeand the policy responses that
(09:46):
are required has been veryinteresting because it seems
like a very straightforward andconsistent issue Housing is too
expensive for people to affordon their incomes.
But the policy responses of whatgovernment should be doing and
how to respond to the challengeswe're facing has changed over
time, has changed over time, andso it's an incredibly complex
(10:11):
issue of everything from zoningrules to interest rates and
financing, to programs andincentives that governments can
put in place, and how we usepublic land and how we use
private land and infrastructureand all these things.
Nobody wants to hear it.
When they can't find a placethat they can rent, that they
can afford to rent, they're justlike where is that place and
how are you going to deliver it?
It's a really hairy problem.
Aaron Pete (10:28):
Agreed, and one of the things I guess I just want
to reflect on is I think it'sreally important that we don't
lose faith, and I don't knowwhere this hopelessness is kind
of being driven from, but Ithink I just bought my first
house, like a couple of weeksago.
Premier David Eby (10:40):
Wow, like a couple of weeks ago.
Wow, congratulations, it was ahuge step but we're very excited
.
Aaron Pete (10:44):
I bet we move in September.
That property transfer tax isgoing to be tough to swallow,
but we've got it all covered andI just I look around at my
peers and go like you need tojust work harder and try harder
and like you need to really pushyourselves.
Like we've been through a lot asCanadians throughout human
history, like we've been througha lot and I think the only
message that I didn't likehearing from so many different
(11:05):
peers and friends was like Idon't know how you're going to
do it, I don't know if it'sgoing to be possible, I don't
know if you should bother.
Maybe it's just a rentersociety now.
And it's like we can rise tothis occasion, like citizens can
rise up and start to take steps, to work hard, try and find
ways to support themselves andgrow into these homes and I know
there's a lot of challenge.
But like that's one of thegreat things to me about being a
Canadian or a British Columbianis like we rise to the occasion
(11:28):
, we step up when we need to andwe do our best to rise up into
those circumstances and I just Iwant there to be more hope in
the atmosphere.
Do you know how we kind ofbring that hope back to people.
Premier David Eby (11:38):
Yeah, aaron, your message of individual
responsibilities are reallyimportant one.
And one of the ways that peoplelose hope is they have that
attitude that you have, like I'mready, I can do it, I'm ready
to go, and then they're foiledby some kind of rule or some
kind of process they have to gothrough or some kind of
requirement that it's completelydeflating.
(12:00):
And then, once you lose thatmomentum, it's really hard to
get it back.
And I'll just give you anexample.
If you're looking at beingcreative and like, how am I
going to be able to afford aplace?
And you're like, okay, well,maybe if I go in with a couple
other friends, we could buy asingle family home and we could
divide it and we could all eachhave our own living space.
(12:21):
And you're like, okay, well,the math works and we figured
out with the credit union howwe're going to do a mortgage and
all these other things.
And then you go to the city andthey say, well, you need to do
a public rezoning process.
It's going to take two years.
It depends on whether or notthe neighbors support a
multi-unit on that site.
And it's like we can't thething that we want to do, that
(12:44):
we can achieve the kind ofhousing in the neighborhood
where we want to be for ourfamily.
You know we can't do it.
It's very like I think thatgovernment's role is to clear as
much of the path as we can forpeople to be able to to leverage
what you're talking about whenyou have the stars aligned in a
way that you're able to takeadvantage of an opportunity and
get into the real estate marketor whatever it is, get that
(13:05):
training, do that new job.
The government's job is toclear the way.
We can't do everything, but wecan clear the way and make it
possible for people to do thesethings.
Aaron Pete (13:15):
The last one on housing is just we at Chihuahua
we've applied to BC Housing forfunds through their Indigenous
Housing Fund.
We're very excited about that.
We're seeing other investmentstake place through BC Housing
and I think affordability is oneof those key pieces where we're
starting to see investments inco-ops or investments in
low-income housing.
Can you talk a little bit aboutthat?
Premier David Eby (13:35):
Yeah, I think one of the things about the
housing challenge that we facein the province and it's not
just us, it's across NorthAmerica and Europe, it's a
conversation around the worldright now is how do we deliver
that affordable housing?
We have to address thespeculation.
We have to address people thatare buying up homes and
converting them into hotel roomsthrough Airbnb or leaving them
vacant as investments and allthose other pieces.
(13:56):
We have to be building morehousing by addressing those
zoning rules I was talking aboutand making it easier and faster
to build the housing we need.
We have to directly fund moreaffordable housing as government
to bring down some of thebarriers for people that can't
afford other types of housing.
We have to use public land moreeffectively by building housing
on it that's actuallyaffordable and attainable for
middle-income people.
(14:16):
We need to do all of thesethings.
We need to do everything thatis possible in every program,
and the thing that is surprisingto me is, in the housing
discussion we're havingpolitically is I hear from the
other parties well, we're notgoing to do this and we're not
going to do that.
We're not going to restrictAirbnbs, we're not going to do
the speculation vacancy tax.
We're not going to allowmultiple units on a single
family lot.
Well, how can you respond to acrisis when it's a?
(14:38):
It's an emergency and I thinkhousing is actually an emergency
that you have to do all thethings.
And so we're doing all thethings and that's the commitment
, and that includes, as you'rementioning, co-ops.
It includes the provincefunding housing on reserve,
which is something that theprovince has never done before.
Because we need to do it.
We just recognize that it hasto be done.
Aaron Pete (15:00):
We have to do all of the things and we're going to
Well, just to comment verybriefly to wrap up this
discussion on housing.
I'm incredibly grateful we putthis application in, but
explaining the BC housingopportunity in comparison to
CMHC and Indigenous ServicesCanada is far better because the
challenge when I joined andtook over the housing portfolio
(15:20):
is we had 89 homes.
None of them had ever beenmaintained, invested in, there
was mold in all of them and Ilost a patch of my hair trying
to address this issue out offear of like people live here.
I would not live here, I wouldnot be willing to be in this
circumstance, so it'sunacceptable.
So we took Christmas off, wepushed forward, I kept doing
applications and trying toprepare, but we'd never had a
(15:41):
clear process.
Like a lot of people don't knowthat we're responsible for
basically the rent, landlord,maintenance of community and
like all of their homes, and wedon't have real big resources to
pull on.
And now we're seeing investmentsfrom the federal government.
But this opportunity to besupported in this housing
investments is is incomparableto any other program because it
(16:02):
puts us in the position to workwith the third party operator to
make sure that people maintaintheir homes, pay their rent on
time and then we actually get tomake sure that it's a quality
place to live for 40 years,rather than building a two-story
place and then not maintainingit for 40 years and looking and
going oh no, look at the housingon reserve, it doesn't look
good.
Like this is a real, solvableissue and like I believe that
(16:22):
the investments the provincialgovernment has made is allowing
indigenous communities to havehousing that's of quality that
people can be proud of, becauseit's not fee simple land.
It's not treated in the sameway, so it's very difficult to
get investments in thosecommunities and I'm just very
grateful for the process thattook place in the quality of
(16:43):
lives.
Premier David Eby (16:44):
I'm really glad to hear that.
I have to admit, when I firstheard the proposal and it was
when John was Premier I was likewhy are we as the province
doing this?
The federal government shouldbe doing this.
It's their responsibilitysquarely.
But the more that I was exposedto the reality that it's just
not going to happen Like if wejust wait for the feds, it's
just not going to happen Then itwas pretty obvious that this
(17:07):
was the right direction.
And to see the results now, asyou say, see these places open
up, people move in it's reallyquite moving and amazing how it
can be transformative in acommunity especially, you know,
a lot of the communities arequite small.
So if you have a 30 unitbuilding or a 20 unit building,
it can be just a massive changein the community.
Aaron Pete (17:25):
That's actually quality right, Like we actually
get to bring in an architect.
They're designing it, they'remaking sure it's top quality.
We're not cheaping out onanything like that.
That's just something mycommunity has never seen, so I'm
super grateful for that Awesome.
The next conversation is fiscalmanagement and credit rating
downgrades.
Under leadership, we've seencredit rating downgrades.
Would you mind talking aboutthat?
Premier David Eby (17:46):
Yeah, we had.
So there are three major creditrating agencies for the
province of BC and one of themdowngraded us and the main
reason given by the agency wasconcern about our capital
expenditure.
So that's capital expenditureis the money that's spent on
(18:07):
building up the province roads,schools, hospitals, housing, the
physical things, not theservices and we have a massive
capital budget.
I'm going to make anannouncement today, actually,
actually about Highway 1, rightout near Abbotsford, and the
reason why we're putting so muchmoney into capital and I think
(18:29):
we're doing it in a responsibleway.
Our debt-to-GDP ratio, which isthe traditional measurement of
whether your debt's sustainableor not, is one of the lowest in
Canada and we continue to bevery careful about managing that
, and we continue to be verycareful about managing that.
But the reason why we'rebuilding up this infrastructure
in the province is because ofthe growth that we're seeing,
the number of people.
So Fraser Valley, where we areright now, has seen a massive
(18:52):
influx of people.
The schools are bursting at theseams because people are
choosing to move here and we doneed those folks to come to help
build the future of BritishColumbia.
But if we don't address thefact that the schools are full,
that the hospitals are full,that the roads are crowded with
traffic.
By building transit, byexpanding the roads, by building
the schools and hospitals, theresulting downgrade in the
(19:15):
quality of life for our provincewill have knock-on effects in
the private sector.
You won't be able to recruitthe employees you need.
You won't be able to ensurethat the employees that you have
decide to stay because theschools aren't good and the
hospital is not good and I'msitting in traffic.
I'm going to go somewhere else.
People are globally mobile rightnow, and so this is a time
where we take the money, we dothe building and we pay it off
(19:38):
over generations, just like ourgrandparents did.
That's the infrastructure thatwe're using right now.
We're using our grandparents'infrastructure and there was a
long period where governmentsaid we're not gonna put the
money into that.
There wasn't a single newschool built in Surrey in the
last four years of the BCLiberal government under John
Rustad and Kevin Falconsimilarly underfunded that
critical infrastructure, and sowe need to build those schools
(19:59):
and it's just not negotiable inmy mind.
We just have to do it and, likea mortgage, you got to borrow
it up front and you pay it offover the lifetime of the
infrastructure.
Aaron Pete (20:06):
Brilliant Reconciliation.
Can you talk to us about theHaida Gwaii title agreement, the
changes to the Land Act andwhat's taking place there?
Premier David Eby (20:16):
Yeah, this was.
Have you ever been to HaidaGwaii?
No, it's amazing.
I went for my first time thisyear and it was really quite an
amazing place 80% Indigenouspopulation, no overlapping
claims from other nations, 20years of Haida governance on
Haida Gwaii and a process thatstarted after Gordon Campbell
(20:41):
had his realization that hecouldn't fight Indigenous title,
that he had to accept that thiswas a reality, going forward,
new relationship work that theydid, continuing that work to its
culmination of recognizingHaida title For the first time,
outside of a court process, fora government to do that in
British Columbia.
Title's been recognized in BC,but only through a decade of
(21:04):
litigation or through discretetreaty negotiations, and so this
is a new way of doing things.
It is a choice.
The choice is can we recognizethe rights that are here, the
rights and title that are here,that we know that a court is
(21:25):
gonna recognize it's veryobvious or do we battle it out
in courts for a decade, payinglawyers a bunch of money no
offense to us as lawyers, right,but paying lawyers a bunch of
money and then coming out theother end with the same result,
except it's been decided fromthe bench and it hasn't been
negotiated between governments.
How are we gonna do this?
And we've seen both models Inthe Silcotin 10 years in court
(21:47):
crashing into title recognitionof the Supreme Court of Canada.
It created a huge uncertainty onthe land Haida Gwaii decades of
negotiation, work, partnershipand resulting in the title
declaration for Haida GwaiiBusinesses, local governments,
haida standing together sayingthis is the right direction.
We're all working together ForSilcotin.
(22:08):
We're still seeing thoseconflicts that went through the
court process and so we justthink it's a much preferable way
of doing things and I'm reallyexcited about that
reconciliation work that we'redoing.
Aaron Pete (22:18):
I agree I think it's one of the leading areas.
Looking at all the differentreconciliation agreements, I
look at Stahelis' and thinkabout that.
For my own community of like,how do we move forward in a good
way and how do we take on moreresponsibility so we can start
to contribute to the economy andkind of share our culture and
language and values in a waywhere it lifts everybody up?
The other piece I'd like totalk about is Métis people as
(22:39):
well.
I work at Métis Nation, BC andget to kind of understand their
culture and their language andtheir values and one of the
areas is the distinctions-basedapproach and I'm just curious if
you could reflect on that andthe role perhaps First Nations
Leadership Council can play inkind of.
I feel like the two are at oddswith each other and perhaps
that's being inflamed in someways.
(23:00):
Would you mind reflecting onthat?
Premier David Eby (23:02):
Yeah, it's a challenge and it's something
I've only really learned aboutthrough my work in government
about the relationship betweenMétis people and British
Columbia and First Nations.
The anxiety, as I understand itfrom nations and it's best to
hear from them directly, but asit's been explained to me is
ensuring that Métis people'srights are recognized, while
(23:26):
recognizing that they're notland-based rights, that the
land-based rights are FirstNations rights and that Métis
people deserve the recognitionaround education and other
services to make sure they'reresponsive to the needs of Métis
people, but that when ittransitions over into land
rights, that's when the nationsstart to get really anxious,
because the nation'sunderstanding is, of course,
(23:48):
that those land rights come frompossession of the land at a
certain period of time under theconstitution, and so that's
where the tension comes in.
Anytime it looks like there areland rights discussions being
had or recognitions like that, Ithink that we're really getting
to a place where there'sbroader understanding within
government about that.
There will continue to betensions, but I've noticed
(24:12):
recently that some of thattemperature is coming down.
We have been working with MétisNation BC on a Métis justice
strategy, the First Nationsjustice strategy.
They're broadly complementarybut they're separate and around
education, similar kinds ofthings, and so finding those
paths to be able to supportMétis people in the province in
the way that they want to besupported and partnered with,
(24:36):
and the same for First Nationsin the province, while
recognizing those criticaldifferences, is really important
, I think, to both groups.
And all of these things are alearning process.
They don't just happenovernight and they come through
experience and working together.
Aaron Pete (24:56):
The next question I have is around the carbon tax.
We're in somewhat of a uniquecircumstance and compared to
other provinces, Would you mindreflecting on that and where
that's sort of gone?
I've spoken to Kevin Falcon whotalked about it being revenue
neutral and he discussed howthat changed under the NDP
leadership.
Would you mind talking aboutthe carbon tax and what your
perspectives are on?
Premier David Eby (25:15):
it?
Yeah, sure.
So the carbon tax wasintroduced in BC under Kevin
Falcon and John Rustad I thoughtthey would never.
You know, they're extremelyreluctant to admit that publicly
and it wasn't revenue neutral.
Government collected that taxand then said it was neutral
because it helped pay for taxcredits that already existed,
for example for the film andtelevision industry.
(25:35):
This was something Mr Falcondid.
So those things aren't correct.
But the situation is currentlywith the carbon taxes.
The federal government has saidyou must charge a certain price
for carbon in your province andso, regardless of what your
provincial government is,everybody is doing that across
Canada right now because that'sthe federal law and there's a
lot of discussion about.
(25:56):
Well, people don't like it atdifferent provinces and all
these different pieces, but theyhave to do it.
It's the federal law and so ifthe federal government changes
that policy, then we'll have alook at how we're doing things
right now.
Changes that policy, then we'llhave a look at how we're doing
things right now.
But in BC, with that carbonprice that the feds require us
(26:16):
to charge, we're ensuring thatthe increase that they imposed
on British Columbians isreturned 100% actually more than
100% back to British Columbiansas best we can and we're using
the existing carbon tax revenuesthat we have to invest in
things like transit, drivingdown emissions and actually
reducing emissions.
And it's how we've been able toreduce emissions despite
dramatic population growth inthe province, which is something
that's important to a lot ofBritish Columbians, and we see
the smoky summers and theextreme heat dome kind of
(26:39):
activities in this province inways they're just starting to
see across Canada.
British Columbians want to knowthat we're addressing the
emissions but also that we'releveraging our benefits to grow
the economy, because we got hugeassets here that help us grow a
low carbon economy, cheapelectricity being the main one,
and our timber supply and ourmass timber industry.
(27:01):
So there are lots of economicopportunities for us in this as
well, and we're trying to tieall those pieces together and
we're seeing the results of agrowing economy and reducing
emissions.
The thing that I don'tunderstand is how in today's day
and age you know John RossStead is the leader of the
conservative says you know Idon't believe in human caused
(27:21):
climate change, it's a hoax andthat if he's elected he'll ban
climate science materials fromclassrooms and he wants to be
the premier of British Columbia.
I mean it's bizarre becausehe's going to miss the economic
opportunity that our kidsdeserve of building a low-carbon
economy.
Because that's where the worldis going, that's where Europe's
going, asia's going and theUnited States hopefully
continues to go.
But also we'll fail to take thenecessary actions to protect
(27:44):
our kids too.
Aaron Pete (27:46):
The other piece I wanted to ask about and this one
.
It doesn't get as much coverage, but it's something that my
communities personally thoughtabout and experienced is
contaminated soil being moved onto First Nation communities and
different areas.
Like I know, some people up inColumbia Valley are dealing with
contaminated soil because, if Iunderstand this correctly, it's
cheaper for them to kind ofconvince a person on their CP
(28:08):
land to kind of move soil ontotheir land and say, hey, we'll
give you $500,000, knowing thatthe cost to actually deal with
it is far greater.
So it's actually worth the cost.
And then they disappear and allthe forms were kind of forged
and they're gone and then we'releft holding the bill and we're
trying to figure out what to do.
And I've heard this withnumerous different First Nation
communities.
I've heard about it withColumbia Valley.
(28:28):
I'm just wondering if you haveany perspectives on how we go
about addressing that, becauseit seems like the incentive is
easier to do it thisinappropriate way, because
there's not enoughaccountability there to kind of
prevent them from impactingriverways and waterways and
freshwater and all of thosethings.
Have you thought about thisissue or heard about it?
Premier David Eby (28:45):
Yes, I have.
Yeah, so there's a couple ofpieces.
One is just fill, generally Onfarming government, we changed a
number of rules around theagricultural land reserve where
just fill was being dumped onfarmland, making it unsuitable
for farming, and there wereinsufficient rules to protect
around that.
And then when there'scontamination, it's another
level.
So we've had to revisit how wedo enforcement because there are
(29:06):
people who have receivedmultiple notices of infraction
and fines and appear to be doingthe math that it's better to
just continue to operate inviolation of the law and pay the
fees and the fines rather thanstop doing what they're doing.
So we've had to go to court toget injunctions and we always
(29:30):
struggle a little bit with thejurisdictional differences when
it comes to reserve land andenforcement on a whole bunch of
different issues.
But even just on straight upprovincial land, we've had to
revisit how we do enforcementbecause these people are highly
motivated.
Because these people are highlymotivated, as you say, there's
a lot of money to be made indumping the soil and where
(29:52):
there's kind of a willingpartnership to evade provincial
restrictions, like I'll take thecontaminated dirt and I won't
say anything.
If you don't say anything, youpay me the right amount of money
.
It can be hard whether or notit's reserve or not reserve land
.
No-transcript for reserve land.
(30:13):
You know the Ministry ofAgriculture and the Ministry of
Water, lands and NaturalResources will keep doing that
work, and Ministry ofEnvironment, of course.
Aaron Pete (30:21):
Interesting Healthcare.
Yeah, andrew Weaver wrote apretty harsh piece on you.
I don't know if you had theopportunity to see it.
Premier David Eby (30:28):
No, I haven't .
Aaron Pete (30:29):
Okay, he criticized the healthcare under your
leadership and your fiscalpolicies and I'm wondering if
you can just reflect.
Of course, your two governmentsat one point in time worked
together and then he wrote thispiece and I'm just curious how
you think about those issues.
Premier David Eby (30:43):
Well, yeah, healthcare is the number one
issue, I would say, for manypremiers across Canada.
It's certainly in our topissues here in British Columbia,
and it's a consistent issue,which is we've had a cohort of
healthcare workers retire fromthe system, especially after
COVID, in large numbers, andwe're also seeing massive
population growth across thecountry, so we see increased
(31:05):
demand for healthcare, and sothe response from the provincial
government has been three parts.
One is we're going to trainmore healthcare workers, new
spaces for doctors and nurses.
We're opening a new medicalschool Recognizing the
international credentials thatpeople are already trained.
They're in British Columbia,they're ready to work, but there
are barriers to them practicingin BC.
And the third is making surethat infrastructure's in place
(31:27):
for them to be able to practice.
The physical spaces, thehospitals in this province are
falling apart, so we're buildingnew hospitals 13 newer,
expanded hospitals right acrossthe province and that also
serves as a way to bring indoctors and nurses because they
come into these beautiful newfacilities.
It costs a lot of money, fiscalmanagement.
(31:48):
These are deliberate decisionsthat governments made to open a
new medical school.
That costs money too.
We've reached a new deal withthe family doctors 300,000 more
British Colombians have familydoctors now than they did before
.
I was sworn in as premier andwe reached that deal, and so
we're making progress on theseissues 7,000 new nurses, 700 new
family doctors, and so we'returning the corner on these
(32:12):
issues, except the critique.
It's not acceptable.
It shouldn't be tolerated thatpeople can't access a family
doctor, that there's a bypass ontheir emergency room or the
emergency room is closed, andthese are issues that are faced
across Canada.
The way we're attacking thisissue is different in British
Columbia, because people deserveaccess to high quality care,
and you're not going to getthere by cutting the healthcare
system, and I guess this will bepart of the discussion.
(32:32):
I can't believe it, but it'llbe part of the discussion.
In the election, john Rostadreleased his healthcare plan, a
suggestion he's going to cut$4.1 billion from our healthcare
system.
Kevin Falcon yesterdayannounced that he's going to
have an unfunded $5 billion taxcut and balance the budget
within a year.
Plus $10 billion has got tocome from somewhere, so he's
going to be cutting healthcaretoo.
(32:52):
The results will only get worse.
People have longer waits forsurgeries.
I don't know how you hirenurses if you're cutting $10
billion from the provincialbudget, and that's what we
desperately need.
Aaron Pete (33:02):
Right.
The one area that has receiveda lot of feedback from me when I
said I had the opportunity tospeak with you is this COVID-19
requirements in healthcareworkers.
Would you mind talking aboutthe decision to change those
rules?
Was it a little bit late?
What are your thoughts on thatto change?
Premier David Eby (33:17):
those rules?
Was it a little bit late?
What are your thoughts on that?
So the provincial healthofficer, bonnie Henry who, by
the way, on COVID, I think hadremarkable results saving lives
responding to the pandemicdeclared the health emergency
over.
Of course the pandemic is overfor COVID, at least in the daily
experiences of most BritishColombians, and the result of
(33:38):
that, the emergency measuresrelated to healthcare workers
expired as well.
We decided not to put aprovincial requirement in that
extended those emergencyrequirements around vaccination
after she ended the emergencyand instead have decided to look
at things like measles, mumps,rubella, covid flu, all these
(34:01):
other types of infectiousdiseases, to require all
healthcare workers to declaretheir vaccination status.
And if there is an outbreak ina facility, the workers who are
unvaccinated can be pulled.
So if there's a measlesoutbreak, we don't have the
unvaccinated workers in thepediatric wards where kids can
die from measles.
They're pulled off the scheduleand they're not working, and so
it's a broader approach tovaccination.
(34:22):
The COVID approach was veryspecific to one disease, but it
felt a little strange to be likeyou must be vaccinated for
COVID, but we don't haveanything to say about the fact
that you're not vaccinated formeasles.
Aaron Pete (34:33):
Do you have any reflections or regrets?
I just I can't imagine yourrole.
Like I think about my community650 members.
I try and keep myselfaccountable to them.
When I ran, I really tried torun on a platform and making
clear what I was going to do,and then I've tried to follow
through on those things, eventhough many First Nation
communities.
One of the things we strugglewith is we vote people based on
(34:53):
last name and not always basedon who has the best ideas or
who's actually following throughon their track record.
I think about my role and thenI think about your
responsibilities and I just thatfeels like a lot of pressure.
I feel like I'm under a lot ofpressure, but yours is at a
higher magnitude, and then youhave to make decisions.
Do you have any regrets or waysyou process the decisions that
you've made throughout yourcareer?
Premier David Eby (35:15):
Yeah, let me just start by saying the first
race I ran that I lost was arace for local government.
I'm very grateful that I lostbecause I actually think when
you're working in a smallcommunity and you're the elected
representative of, in your case, just over 600 people, you're
accountable and available in afrontline way that at the
(35:35):
provincial level and the federallevel especially, you're more
insulated from School boardtrustees, city councilors,
mayors and others, first Nationscouncil members and chairs,
chiefs they're all moreimmediately accountable in the
community.
So I wouldn't understate thenature of the pressure that you
(35:57):
face compared to the provincialgovernment.
There are always things and Iimagine you've run into a
similar situation there arealways things that you would do
differently in hindsight.
That's the amazing and awesomepower of hindsight.
All you can do is, when youmake a decision and you go
forward and it's not working outthe way that you want and it's
(36:19):
not having the results you want,maybe it's having the complete
opposite of the results that youwant you have to have the
humility and the willingness tosay this didn't work and here
are the reasons it didn't work.
And, um, we're going to go inthis different direction and I
think that that for me, if Ican't do that and get reelected,
(36:39):
then it's just who.
I am right.
We're here to solve problems,not to be ideological about it,
to force through and say, oh,just wait a few more, it's going
to keep working.
We need to be able to say no,we're going to try something
different, and I think that thatactually is something that will
rebuild trust in government forpeople is if elected officials
(37:02):
are willing to say yeah, youknow, like we used to pick up
the newspaper and kind of agreeon the issues and now it feels
like more and more people havesub issues and they have
(37:23):
different perspectives oneverything, and I think it's so
important that we just keepthings about the issues and how
we can kind of go aboutaddressing them.
Aaron Pete (37:30):
Do you have any examples of things you might've
done differently or kind of thatyou look back on and go if I
had a chance to do that overagain, or maybe you're already
doing some of those things.
Premier David Eby (37:38):
Yeah, just to pick up on your comment, then
I'll give you some examples.
I actually think it's a sign ofstrength and not a sign of
weakness to be able to say itdidn't work, we're going to try
something else.
And, to be frank, in that way,and there is a culture and a
sort of understanding ofpolitics right now that's like
you never apologize, you neveradmit that you were going in the
wrong direction.
(37:58):
You never and you always insistthat it was the right thing to
do.
And we can see it in a lot ofdifferent examples, but the one
that and we talked about alittle bit earlier, but the one
that definitely jumps to mind isdecriminalization.
You know, here's a scenariowhere we're working with the
police and they're supportive ofour approach.
The advocates are supportive ofour approach.
(38:20):
Public health people aresupportive of our approach.
We say and I am supportive.
I have been a drug prosecutor.
I prosecuted a young indigenouswoman.
It was one of the mosttraumatic experiences of my life
.
I wasn't even on the stand, Iwas the prosecutor and I saw
that this wouldn't change herlife at all and that this whole
courthouse had been arrayedagainst her, that I was getting
paid, her lawyer was gettingpaid, the judge was getting paid
(38:42):
, the sheriff was getting paid,everyone was looked after except
for her, and she wasimmediately released.
I was a junior prosecutor.
It was a minor violation and soshe didn't go to jail or
anything.
There was no consequence andshe left worse off, less
trustful of the system.
And so when the suggestion cameforward, like why don't we move
away from this model of usingthe criminal law around people
(39:04):
who are addicted?
Why don't we move to this modelof where instead we're focused
on treatment and we use themoney around prosecuting and all
this other stuff to focus ontreatment, get people in
treatment and get away and thenreduce some of the stigma around
using?
And the outcome was in manyways heartbreaking for me
(39:24):
because you know, it's such afirm understanding that the
criminal justice system is notsuited to address addiction and
I still strongly believe that.
But to see that you know peoplestruggling so hardcore with
addiction that, in the absenceof criminalization, that they're
using on the bus, that they'reusing at the Tim Hortons,
they're using at the hospital,they're using in the middle of
(39:46):
the public park where the kidsare nearby, because the only
thing that's driving them in themoment is the addiction and the
police saying because youremoved our ability to arrest
and move people and seize drugsand so on through
decriminalization, we don't havea tool to address this anymore,
having to take that step backand say, okay, that was not the
result, that was never theintention that we wanted.
(40:07):
We have to take a differentapproach here to recriminalize
public drug use Really difficultand necessary and I think, also
hopefully a measure and a stepto increase trust in the public
like, okay, we do understandwhere you're trying to go, we'll
give you the rope to be able totry different things, but we
(40:28):
want to know that if it's notworking out the way that you
wanted, that you're going to fixit and you're going to go in a
different direction.
And so I hope that's whatpeople are saying and that's
what I'm sure we'll be talkingabout in the election as well.
Aaron Pete (40:36):
Yeah, I was a native court worker for five years and
I had the privilege of workingwith so many different clients
and I do think that investmentsin recovery and treatment are so
important.
I'd have to send people, inorder for them to get bail, into
recovery homes where we knewthat the person running the home
was struggling with drug usethemselves, and then I'd have to
bring the person back and go.
Well, they weren't successful.
(40:57):
They ended up doing drugs again.
But it was because of thesekind of outlying issues that,
like we don't control who'srunning these homes, they're
making minimum wage and theykind of promote people up with
from within, and so it's notalways effective.
But I will say, like I knowthat the court system isn't
always the best place, but Ihave seen such a beauty in how
people have approachedreconciliation since working
(41:19):
with Crown Council, working withjudges.
I think they really dounderstand the Gladue decision.
I think they understand that weneed to support people in a
better way.
We just need those wraparoundresources to help people stay on
the right track.
But, like one of my favoritestories and then we can start to
wrap up here is just thisindividual came in.
They were struggling theirwhole lives.
They had been sexually abusedsince a child.
(41:39):
I walked through their storyand their experiences that they
had told me.
I presented that to the crownand to the judge and told their
story, and the judge was justable to look at the person and
say, hey, like I know, you'vebeen through horrible things,
that, like we wouldn't worsewish on our worst enemy and like
I am so sorry and I amacknowledging the things you've
been through, but I want you togo reach your full potential,
(42:00):
because you're capable of somuch more.
You're a smart person.
You deserve better than thislife.
And that was incredibly moving,and it's not always a great
place to do things in the courtsystem, but there is something
about that person sitting upthere in a robe, being able to
validate the things that you'vebeen through that were wrong,
disgusting and horrible, andhave that kind of authority
figure, give life to your storyand respect it and then want you
(42:22):
to go into a better direction.
And so I do just think thepeople in that system are so
much more amazing than Iimagined.
When I was in my undergraduatedegree and we talked about
systemic racism, I was sort ofimagining that there was going
to be a person being like whocares about these people, and
then just seeing all thesepeople want the best is
something that gives me realhope as we go into the future.
But would you mind tellingpeople how they can follow your
(42:42):
campaign, follow your work, sothey can stay informed about the
issues?
Premier David Eby (42:46):
Yeah, sure, I'm pretty easy to track down.
You can follow me on all thethings.
I'm on Twitter at Daveunderscore EB, I'm on Facebook,
instagram and I'm a Googlesearch away.
Aaron Pete (43:00):
Okay, brilliant.
I appreciate you being willingto take the time to have this
conversation.
I love that we got to do a longform conversation.
It wasn't three minutes.
We were able to really get intosome of these issues and I find
that admirable for you to putyourself out.
You didn't exactly know what wewere going to be discussing
today, but you trusted theprocess and I just really
appreciate the opportunity tokind of dive into these things.
I felt like you were reallytransparent and willing to kind
(43:20):
of dive into the tough topics.
So thank you so much for comingout today.
Premier David Eby (43:23):
Yeah, thanks for having me, Aaron.
It was a great show, andcongratulations on your work
here too.
Thank you.
Aaron Pete (43:28):
Today's episode is made possible in part by support
from Enbridge, fueling qualityof life in British Columbia for
over 65 years.
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