Eby And The BC NDP's Looming Crisis

On How Eby Won

I’m not going to lie to you, I have barely followed the BC NDP’s drama recently. Like, I know the very basics, but I can barely give you anything more than the worst, most superficial summary – which is, hilariously, intentional, because my level of knowledge is probably close to the average BC resident’s.

Here’s my basic understanding of the path we’ve taken to get to Eby’s (kind of, sort of) unopposed election as leader of the BC NDP. No members of the caucus or amongst the federal MPs for BC wanted to run to oppose Eby, the left wanted to make Eby sweat, they found the 2021 federal candidate for Granville, and then the left actually might have made it close so the BC NDP booted her for coordination with outside groups.

Whether or not the BC NDP had the grounds to do so or not is entirely irrelevant to me – the perception, for good or ill, is that they booted the challenger the second the challenger was actually a legitimate challenge. This has no led to calls for leadership elections to be managed by Elections BC, and talk of whether or not this will matter for the next election. And the thing is, I think this has been a massive fuckup by the NDP.

(Let me dispense of the first part – internal party democracy is not a matter of public interest. If the BC NDP, or the Ontario Liberals, or whoever, wanted to elect their leader through a fucking random lottery announced by papal smoke, it is not a matter of public interest. The members of the party may be upset with that, but that is a matter for the party to weigh in deciding their rules. If the NDP want Eby, they should be free to manipulate things as they wish, and nobody should stop them from choosing their leader in the manner they choose.)

…

The reason this is a problem for the NDP is not because there is an army of people on the left of the NDP who will suddenly vote Green and let the Liberals up the middle on 29% of the vote, as some worry about. The number of people who feel aggrieved by the conduct of this and who actually voted NDP in the last election might number 10000 (and I am being generous). Given that the NDP membership is going to be concentrated in safe NDP seats, seems unlikely there’s enough of a movement to cost the NDP even one seat, let alone enough to cost them an election.

That said, there is a broader question of party management for Eby, because his whole job as leader is to straddle a very difficult divide – keep the left of the party, who reluctantly voted for them in 2020 because Horgan had managed to avoid the bad health outcomes of Washington State from repeating up here, on board after 5 years of governance from a Premier that many on the NDP’s left view as insufficiently radical.

Eby’s job at this point is to inject enough radicalism to keep the left on board and re-enthuse them on his project without scaring socially liberal, fiscal moderates who made up the Clark 2017-Horgan 2020 voters that gave Horgan not just a majority, but a healthy one. The problem for the NDP was that coalition was probably never going to hold again, but they need to avoid too much slippage on either flank if they want to be returned again. And now, the price to woo back the left just got higher.

The left of the NDP will be looking for something from Eby to show that they are a valued part of the party – both in policy and cabinet appointments – and their price for letting this go will now be higher than it would have been if he just won a members vote. And whatever they give the left comes at a price – probably, if I’m being plain, from their right flank.

The reason Horgan leaves office as one of 2 left wing provincial Premiers is simple – his NDP was a firmly centre-left party in a province that lacks a staunchly right wing party. I know some of my more left-wing readers won’t like me saying this, but the BC Liberals are just firmly not as bad as the average Canadian conservative party. Are they great? God no, but given we live in a democracy and sometimes the other guys win, they’re as good as you can get for when the other side has to win.

Eby has to convince two very different groups of voters to stay the course – mostly younger renters who see radicalism as necessary to handle the dual crises of climate change and housing, and older, well paid voters who either reluctantly bought into the housing market in the last few years (and therefore don’t want to risk a price crash) or people who bought 15 years ago and have a paid off million dollar easter egg under them.

This coalition was always going to be tough, but Eby now will face a left more hostile, and a leader of the movement for the disaffected to rally behind. If Eby makes the right noises and governs like Horgan, the left are going to lose their ever loving minds, and probably march to the Greens. If Eby tells them to get on board or get out, they’ll listen (and get out), so he’s stuck, trying desperately to placate people who don’t think he won fairly.

Can he thread the needle? Sure – BC has the money that he can spend where needed without annoying his right flank, but the thing is, if the left is going to insist on higher taxes on the rich, in many cases that’s going to be a tax rise on the voters they won in 2020. If Eby is smart, the needle can be thread, but it will involve more than a few half loafs, as it were.

Is the left of the NDP willing to accept that? I don’t know, but the problem is that Eby is the new Premier with exactly zero goodwill from them – a dangerous spot to be in. When, exactly, have the words “Canadian left” and “pragmatism” been used in combination recently?

The problem is, they have to be here. The BC Liberals, after years of nonsense, have returned to the land of the sane, and pose a real threat to the NDP. The NDP take that seriously, in that they knew Eby was their only shot to win.

Now let’s hope their voters do as well.