David Eby has one big pipeline-sized problem

This is the premier’s blind spot, part of a habitually stubborn persona that serves to weaken his popularity on this and other issues. He keeps treating any pipeline debate as a purity test of climate virtue. Voters aren’t doing that anymore. They’re balancing climate goals with security, reconciliation and economic practicality. This appears a balance Eby refuses to acknowledge, and in misreading the province, the map is now against him. It’s difficult to find a constituency genuinely aligned with the premier’s stance, at least in exploring what conditions might make it feasible. Ottawa sees a northern corridor as part of a national strategy. Alberta is actively engaged and willing to negotiate. Indigenous nations in the north are some of the strongest advocates. Industry wants certainty, not vetoes. B.C. residents want conditions, not prohibitions. Eby is politically alone in a way few premiers ever are. He isolated himself from the conversation with a front-loaded rejection of the project, even a surly description of it as a fantasy with no backers and thus undeserving of discussion. Then he sulked when he was left out of the dialogue. Both the prime minister and Albertan premier now commit in their energy pact to work with him, but he has more work to do in getting his head into the game. In the last few days, to be fair, Eby has subdued his no-way tirade, ruling out a lawsuit and resigning himself to the reality that the federal government can impose the project if it wishes. It has not so much been a surrender as an acceptance his position has stationed him as a lone wolf again. His argument has shifted to claiming instead that a project like the pipeline will be an “energy vampire” to suck the necessary resources from other projects. And he is trying to keep the environmentalist and part of the Indigenous base content by opening his mind to the possibility of the project as long as the tanker ban persists–although that would rule out a pipeline terminating in Kitimat, Port Rupert or any port within the moratorium zone. Even Rustad’s goading in recent days, taunting Eby to call an election on the issue, lands precisely because the premier is visibly outnumbered. Rustad has many of his own problems, but his needling exposes Eby’s core vulnerability. You don’t call an election on a position the public won’t rally behind. Eby knows it. Rustad knows it. So, increasingly, do voters. Thus, the slight shift in position, because Eby may well want an election by the spring. The message to him is that British Columbians aren’t rejecting climate policy. They’re rejecting incoherence. People see Eby’s contradictions. LNG revenue is welcomed, but LNG infrastructure is opposed. Climate targets are promoted, but the clean-energy supply chain is blocked. Reconciliation is championed, but Indigenous-led economic projects are resisted. This is the weakness Eby created himself. He’s governing as if climate policy is the only axis of legitimacy. The electorate is more multidimensional than that. In today’s B.C., climate sincerity matters, but so does economic seriousness. Voters want both. Eby is offering only one. The most transformative shift in Canada’s energy landscape is Indigenous ownership. This is where the premier’s stance becomes not just politically questionable, but intellectually unsound. Nations across northern B.C. have articulated a clear strategy of equity stakes, long-term revenue, and strategic control over the infrastructure that crosses their territories. That model aligns with reconciliation, economic autonomy, and national interest. It is, for many northern nations, the very thing they’ve spent a generation fighting for. Eby is opposing what those nations actually want. That’s the political wound he can’t cauterize. It cuts directly across the stories the BC NDP tells about itself, that of alignment with the marginalized, respect for Indigenous self-determination, and understanding of rural economic realities. The public sees the contradiction. So do northern leaders. The premier appears to believe he is saving the public from something they don’t fully understand. But British Columbians do understand what’s at stake. That responsible development doesn’t mean reckless development. That Indigenous consent isn’t symbolic, but a different form of leadership. That economic opportunity in the north isn’t optional for the province. That climate progress requires pragmatic infrastructure choices. British Columbians don’t oppose development. They oppose being told there’s no room for balanced judgment. Eby’s position has trapped him between two political realities. He cannot support the project without alienating his activist flank. He cannot oppose it without alienating the rest of the province. Eby needs to shift from a stance of opposition to one of conditional openness, even to one of leadership for this project as part of a larger pact on what are already projects in the province. That’s where British Columbians already sit. That’s where Indigenous leadership already stands. That’s where Ottawa and Alberta already are. The question is whether Eby can get there before the political consequences become irreversible. Maybe he is starting to understand the worst place for a premier to be is alone. And on this file, Eby has been very, very alone. Politicians can survive mistakes, but not being left behind.