Eby Pledges to Curb Cabinet Power in Controversial Tariff Response Bill

Critics had complained about a lack of legislative oversight

Andrew MacLeod

2025-03-28

The B.C. government is backing off on the part of a tariff response bill that critics said would give cabinet too much power to act without scrutiny from the legislature.

“Across the board people understand the intent of this bill, which is to ensure that we’re able to respond quickly to executive orders from the president that target our economy,” Premier David Eby said this morning. “But what they would like to see is increased ability and increased oversight, safeguards, in relation to the legislative assembly process.”

Attorney General Niki Sharma introduced Bill 7, the Economic Stabilization (Tariff Response) Act, on March 13 saying it was “enabling legislation” that would allow the government to quickly respond to threats from U.S. President Donald Trump.

A section of Bill 7 would have allowed the B.C. cabinet to make regulations for “addressing challenges, or anticipated challenges, to British Columbia arising from the actions of a foreign jurisdiction,” reducing interprovincial trade barriers and supporting the economy of B.C. and Canada.