Wednesday February 26, 2025 | VICTORIA, BC
by Mary P Brooke | Island Social Trends
The efforts that British Columbians are making to ‘buy Canadian’ are “heartwarming” for Premier David Eby.
He also hears from ‘regular’ Americans that they apologize for President Trump’s aggression toward Canada.
These are just two of the sentiments that Eby mentioned today during a media scrum out front of the main BC Legislative building.
His list of worries includes food security and the cost of food especially with a weakened Canadian dollar being “front of mind for so many Canadian families”.
He continues to meet with his BC Trade and Economic Advisory Council (co-chaired by three industry leaders) and his BC cabinet economy and tariffs committee (chaired by Ravi Kahlon, BC Minister of Housing and Municipal Affairs), and has met with the recently casted industry-led task force on agriculture and food economy.
The federal government now has a committee around money-laundering. “This is long overdue and a very welcome development. But in no way justifies the tariffs we have seen,” said Eby today regarding the tariff threat linked by Trump to requests about strengthening border security between Canada and the US.
What comes next:
“What I think all Canadians and Amercians would like –especially in the business community — is to have this threat removed entirely and resolve this uncertainty,” said Premier Eby today.
The so-called deadline of March 4 (the certainty of dates from Trump is never reliable) is the same day that Budget 2025 will be announced by BC Finance Minister Brenda Bailey. Although this morning, Trump said the tariffs may be shifted to be imposed on April 2.
Bailey has expressed distress for weeks that the possibility of four years of tariffs has been overlaid onto BC’s economic goals and opportunities. She delivered a pre-budget announcement on February 13.
Forestry sector:
Eby says BC is prepared to impose counter-tariffs on the same day as any tariffs imposed by the US. “Trump won’t be able to sell their lumber to us with these tariffs in place,” he told media today.
“Softwood lumber duties need to be a critical part of the discussion,” said Eby today. It’s a deliberate strategy to weaken Canada and reduce the likelihood that Americans will invest in our country, Eby explained.
Earlier this month Forests Minister Ravi Parmar said that a 25% tariff on top of existing softwood lumber duty fees could push the duties up to 50% or more.
BC will need to find new customers and “get new products across the line”, says Eby. That will “create jobs and form that strong base for our economy”. Parmar leads a BC Softwood Lumber Advisory Council that was set up earlier this month.
“We need to be all hands on deck about this, at both the federal and provincial economy,” said Eby.
Trump’s distruptive style:
“The nature of this is so destabilizing,” says Eby regarding the rapidly evolving issue multiple tariff threats against Canada. “He’s not even totally clear from his statement what he meant. This is no way to run a country.”
Eby says Trump is being contradictory and inconsistent. Today Eby said he encourages the president to have a formal discussion “country to country” and to “have this resolved”.
While that makes sense in a normal political environment, Trump does not offer normal, typical or consistent as part of his package. Trump knows full well that this throws ‘regular’ politicians off their game.
Federal leadership, inter-provincial trade:
As for federal leadership, Premier Eby is “looking forward to the Liberals resolving their leadership uncertainty and getting a prime minister in place”.
Eby wants to ensure that BC has “tools in place that enmesh with work of other provinces”. This is about inter-provincial trade, something that has eluded premiers across the province for decades.
Eby indicates that he’s willing to enter bilateral agreements with other jurisdictions if the federal government can’t get an agreement.
This week BC Jobs, Economic Development and Innovation Minister Diana Gibson has been meeting with counterpart ministers responsible for internal trade.
A “mutual recognition approach” is what Eby wants to see. ” If it’s good enough for your province it’s good enough for our province. We need to start acting like a country,” said Eby today.
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