PENTICTON — More than two weeks into the writ period and the BC NDP campaign messaging continues to be ever-changing, with Premier David Eby having shifted to campaigning against his own government's record on healthcare.
The campaign kicked off when the writ dropped on September 22. Looking ahead, voters can mark several key dates on the calendar: October 14 is the televised debate; advance polls open just two days later on October 16; and civic election day begins one day later on October 17. Final voting day is October 24.
Eby calls the waits he presides over 'unacceptable'
Eby spent Tuesday framing healthcare struggles as an issue he is determined to fix, effectively campaigning against his own administration's record. Speaking in Coquitlam at Eagle Ridge Hospital, Eby conceded that surgical wait times across British Columbia remain dire.
“Right now in the province, people can wait 10 weeks for surgeries, but they can also wait 50 weeks or more for some surgeries, and that is totally unacceptable,” Eby said.
The political rhetoric marks a shift for the premier. In June, Eby focused attacks on former Conservative leader Kerry-Lynne Findlay, comparing her leadership to a “MAGA regional manager.”
Findlay resigned just two days before Eby dropped the writ, and he's been struggling to find a campaign message that sticks ever since.
Following the writ drop, Eby released a video urging voters to build a "firebreak" against conservative policies.
But that messaging fell flat when a vintage video clip of newly appointed Conservative interim leader Lorne Doerkson putting out a fire emerged shortly thereafter.
On September 24, TrendingPolitics.ca posted a 45-second video showing Conservative leader Lorne Doerkson, then a first-term MLA, hauling a fire hose through heavy smoke alongside another worker near a forest blaze.
The account framed it as a resurfaced clip of Doerkson "pitching in to help residents facing the flames," citing account @NoContextBCGov from a day earlier.
During a Maple Ridge availability later that morning, reporter Katie DeRosa noted Eby offered no comment on the hose video.
When asked whether he regretted comparing Donald Trump to a raging wildfire, Eby stood firm, stating he will "never apologize" for calling out threats posed by the former US president.
By Tuesday, Eby stood at a lectern in front of hospital diagnostic signage to decry healthcare delays, drawing immediate pushback from political opponents who pointed out the NDP has governed the province since 2017.
The BC Conservatives seized on Eby's admission in a news release, citing Fraser Institute data showing a 32.2-week median wait time from referral to treatment in 2025.
The release also cited SecondStreet statistics reporting 16,791 deaths among British Columbians on surgical and diagnostic wait lists between 2022-23 and 2025-26.
The 'secret' insurance letter that wasn't a secret
Healthcare was not the only battlefield on Tuesday. Eby and the NDP accused the Conservatives of plotting to double ICBC auto insurance rates by ending no-fault coverage, relying on claims from MoveUP union officials and a 2022 Ernst & Young report comparing Alberta and BC driver profiles.
Eby released a video alleging Doerkson made secret promises to personal injury lawyers to dismantle the current system.
However, Doerkson’s September 29 letter was hardly a "secret," as claimed by Eby.
It was widely distributed to multiple legal and insurance bodies, including the Insurance Bureau of Canada, the Law Society of BC, and the Canadian Bar Association’s BC branch.
Aisha Estey quote-posted that clip at 6:57 a.m. PDT Wednesday. She is a lawyer and past president of the Conservative Party of BC. "It's not a 'secret letter,'" she wrote. Organizations write to parties to gauge a position, she said, and the NDP write and answer those letters too.
She said the NDP "lied" in 2017 about a plan to bring in no-fault insurance, that the regime "stripped accident victims of all their rights," and that it came at "ZERO savings to customers."
Fellow lawyer and the former campaign manager for Conservative leadership candidate Kerry-Lynne Findlay, Chris Dyson, also offered a correction to Eby's claim, noting that the Conservative Party letter's proposal was a publicly-stated leadership-campaign promise of Findlay's.
He wrote that the NDP, with Eby as attorney general, ran a "hybrid tort/no-fault system from 2019-2021" that stabilized rates, let ICBC earn a profit, and left serious-injury claims in court.
Doerkson, he added, should be congratulated for adopting one of her policies: a move off what he calls the NDP's "pure no-fault" and "road tax" system, toward a "middle ground" that keeps tort rights for the seriously injured. He said that middle ground was part of her platform and "an item under" the Western Alliance policy he developed.
The BC Conservatives responded with a concise one-paragraph statement accusing the NDP of “inventing numbers to scare drivers.”
OneBC immigration proposal demands powers it admits it lacks
OneBC issued a detailed two-page policy proposal on Tuesday demanding Quebec-style provincial immigration powers, including background checks and mandatory language proficiency in English or French.
The party statement argued that BC should screen newcomers to ensure they are unaffiliated with extremist movements, explicitly naming groups such as the IRGC, Hamas, Hezbollah, Samidoun, the Chinese Communist Party, and the Khalistan movement.
While Ottawa officially lists the IRGC, Hamas, Hezbollah, and Samidoun as terrorist organizations, neither the CCP nor the broader "Khalistan movement" carry federal terrorist designations.
On page two, the statement conceded legal reality, explicitly acknowledging that "the provincial government does not have deportation powers."
Instead, OneBC proposed withholding provincial public benefits from non-citizens convicted of crimes and using provincial revenue to assist federal deportation agencies.
Elections BC records show OneBC has fielded 33 candidates statewide under interim leader Dallas Brodie. The party was not invited to participate in the October 14 televised debate.
