Eby climbs down from DRIPA pause after climbing down from confidence vote

VANCOUVER — BC Premier David Eby is set to outline his government’s next steps on the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples Act Monday after a weekend of conflicting signals that saw his office first signal plans to immediately suspend key provisions of the law, only to pull back hours later.Eby’s office told the First Nations Leadership Council on Saturday that the government planned to table legislation Monday seeking to suspend core components of DRIPA and the Interpretation Act for one year, with the ability to extend the suspension. The premier had signalled something similar to reporters all last week. But by Sunday evening, it was reported no such legislation would be introduced during the current spring session. Eby is instead scheduled to hold a news conference Monday on the matter..A week earlier, Eby hosted another Monday press conference, advertised as a brief for reporters on the effects of the Iran conflict..It was immediately seen, and reported, as an obvious attempt at misdirection and to change the channel from the DRIPA fiasco and Eby’s fresh climb-down on making the proposed suspension a confidence vote due to caucusresistance..The misdirection failed. Reporters asked zero questions about Iran. Instead, Eby faced 15 straight questions on DRIPA, his ever-changing position, and the string of reversals.“How many climbdowns does your government have left when it comes to this issue?” one reporter asked.“It is just my preferred way to do things. Obviously, I’d like to be right 100% of the time, right out of the gate,” Eby replied. “That is not me. But recognizing, when we get things wrong, that we’re willing to take a step back, fix it and move forward is, in fact, a strength of this government.”It now appears Eby is climbing down from his own climb-down, though it remains unclear just how subterranean this is set to go..Just days earlier, Eby had committed to a pause or major amendment to DRIPA — even floating the idea of a confidence vote over the issue — before climbing down after opposition within his own caucus, notably from Indigenous MLA Joan Phillip of Vancouver-Mount Pleasant.Phillip publicly stated she could not support any amendments. Eby then indicated he would return to the drawing board but remained committed to changes, suggesting he might even extend the spring session if necessary..The weekend developments represent yet another reversal, with the government now appearing to step back from immediate legislative action altogether.Eby had argued the suspension was needed to address “huge legal uncertainty” stemming from several landmark BC Court cases in 2025 on indigenous issues in the province.A December BC Court of Appeals decision in the Gitxaala case found the province’s mineral claims regime inconsistent with the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples and said the government’s commitments under DRIPA have “immediate legal effect.”.Eby warned the ruling could affect all provincial laws, with about 20 other lawsuits already amended to cite the decision.Merle Alexander, external counsel for the B.C. Assembly of First Nations and a member of the group that drafted DRIPA, said the government’s interpretation of the Gitxaala decision as creating an “incredible litigation threat” is unreasonable.“The harder we have to fight the Premier, the harder it’s going to be to build the kind of relationship that existed before he decided he wanted to amend DRIPA,” Sayers said in an interview Sunday. “We’ve been going along at a good pace, changing other legislation, entering into agreements and working on reconciliation. Are people going to be able to trust this man again? I don’t think so.”DRIPA was passed unanimously in 2019 under then-premier John Horgan, creating a binding obligation to align provincial legislation with UNDRIP.

Eby climbs down from DRIPA pause after climbing down from confidence vote

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