Before he starts a near 12-hour Saturday of campaign events, Premier David Eby sits at his dining room table and watches his two-month-old daughter Gwen kick her legs around on the playmat below. He’s always seemed a man of limitless political energy, ever since he out-hustled Christy Clark in 2013 to upset the then-premier in her riding of Vancouver-Point Grey.

But now, a decade later in political life, two years into holding the top office, with his third child squiggling away on the floor, you begin to see the edges of his ambition.

“It’s definitely harder to leave,” he says, lingering in the family living room.

It’s just a moment, and then the 48-year-old BC NDP leader is up and out the door — whisked into the vortex of political life, tour schedules, aides, security escorts, candidates, crowds, handshakes and selfies.

It’s like watching someone pulled away by an enormous riptide. But if you look very closely, you can see Eby quietly kicking against the current. It’s as if he knows his political life depends upon it.

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Born in Kingston, Ont., Eby emerged the natural politician of four children born to a school teacher mother and personal injury lawyer father. He was student council president in high school, an early activist against the treatment of elephants in the circus, a skilled debater in law school and, eventually, an outspoken advocate for the poor and vulnerable in Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside.

Eby got into law, he jokes, to sue politicians. Now he’s the one getting sued — first as attorney general, from 2017 to 2022, then as premier.

His critics say his major reforms to permit decriminalization of drugs, restrict short-term rentals, override municipalities on housing and introduce no-fault vehicle insurance have been too radical.

Eby argues bold policies were needed to tackle the major crises. His promise upon being sworn in 21 months ago was to show voters “real, concrete things that they can see, that they can touch, that show them the direction that we're going.”

Eby says he’s honoured the spirit.

“On the vast majority of issues, yes,” he says. “There have been some where we’ve had to reset course, particularly around decriminalization.”

The BC Conservatives have turned Eby’s promise into an attack ad, contrasting it with the reality of addictions, homelessness and street disorder. Despite a record deficit and a 20 per cent increase in government spending since becoming premier, the Conservatives say Eby has failed to actually show improvements to key areas like health care, child care and housing.

“The bottom line you can see in his approach he’s very much a control freak and doesn’t respect governance and process,” says BC Conservative Leader John Rustad. “He’s desperate to find answers, but doesn’t understand the way he’s going doesn’t work.”

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As a politician, Eby has always been a bit of a lone wolf.

He ran his 2013 grassroots campaign to unseat the premier almost entirely by himself. After he became Opposition housing critic, he made his name with inventive attacks on BC Liberal government cash-for-access fundraisers and foreign buyer housing policies — organizing his own media events and crafting his own political campaigns, much to the frustration of the BC NDP leader’s office.

Eby carried that through into attorney general and housing minister, pushing major reforms to ICBC, housing policy and money laundering on his own terms. He ignored the all-controlling premier’s office. He broke with fellow cabinet ministers, like then-finance minister Selina Robinson.

Eventually, Horgan removed Eby from the powerful cabinet committee that approves major spending, called treasury board. When Horgan went to retire in 2022, Eby was not his preferred successor.

Despite all that, or perhaps because of it, Eby’s political career has flourished.

He’s been adept at identifying areas of public anger and proposing bold solutions. To him, the political ends of achieving the right policy have justified the isolated and at times controlling means. Along the way, his opponents have either stepped aside, or been steamrolled by his focus and work........

© BIV