Adam Pankratz: Eby’s campaign goes from bad to worse with daycare fiasco

The B.C. NDP election campaign took another turn towards oblivion over the weekend when it emerged that Leader David Eby’s family took a spot in one of the province’s $10-a-day daycare facilities. Following Eby’s bizarre attacks last week on local philanthropist Jim Pattison for the crime of being successful, this latest episode raises the question of who Eby has more disdain for: billionaires or single mothers trying to access his government’s hard-to-find $10 daycare spaces.

Brought in under former NDP premier John Horgan, the $10-a-day daycare program was planned to be universal, but currently only 10 per cent of the province’s daycare spots fall into that category and B.C. cities have the highest daycare fees in the country.

Many parents will tell you how hard it is to find a daycare spot of any type close to Vancouver. Finding the much-coveted $10-a-day spots is near impossible. This is why Eby’s daycare revelation has been met with such immediate outrage.

To be clear, Eby has not done anything illegal or broken any rules. B.C. has no means test for the $10 spots. But we do know that as premier, Eby earns $227,000 a year, and his wife is a doctor. That means a family income likely approaching $500,000, if not more — not exactly the people the limited $10 daycare spots are supposed to benefit.

No one should begrudge Eby and his family for their financial success, but voters are more than entitled to raise their eyebrows at a premier who talks of defending the interests of those less fortunate, while filching daycare spots designed for the working mothers and families he loves to crow about on the campaign trail. Once again, Eby’s hypocrisy is on full display.

In response to another campaign misstep, Eby has been quick to point out that his family made a donation to the daycare in question as they “felt that we did not need that discount.” Fair enough. But what would Eby say to the person in need who never got access to that spot?

This latest faux-pas is one of many during a campaign that, from Day 1, has been poorly planned and executed. Eby sought to take advantage of a B.C. Conservative party in disarray with serious leadership issues.

However, his early and unnecessary election call coalesced the Conservatives behind their new leader, Lorne Doerkson, as they jettisoned the people that were causing the issues: namely, former leader Kerry-Lynne Findlay and the more fringe elements of the party.

As a result, the initial NDP campaign plan of running against U.S. President Donald Trump and Findlay — Trump’s “regional manager,” as Eby called her — fell flat from the start. It hasn’t recovered.

Polls show that British Columbians have been unimpressed by what they see as a totally unnecessary election call. They are also wise to the fact that having been suddenly unable to run against Trump, Eby and the NDP can’t run on their record.

A darkly comic example of this occurred about a week ago, as Eby stood at a campaign stop and announced that hospital wait times in B.C. are “totally unacceptable.” Practically any British Columbian will tell you that’s true. But those same British Columbians also know that the NDP has been in government for nine years and are responsible for the mess. With no one but themselves to blame, the NDP are flailing and lost.

Starting Friday, advance polls open for David Eby’s ill-advised election. It remains to be seen if there is any chance that Eby and the NDP can pull a complete 180 from the first half of their awful campaign.

National Post