A free NDP is the party’s best chance to win back the Canadian working class

NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh and his party’s clear break with the parliamentary supply-and-confidence agreement presents a crucial opportunity to mount a serious challenge to Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre in the next election. While I know Ottawa insiders, political observers and some voters may be skeptical, let me explain why this is not the time to go into an election looking like a centrist coalition — and why the NDP is now better positioned to counter the Conservatives.

In Europe the modest rise of the far right coincided with the decline of centrist parties. In the EU elections last June, far-right parties gained ground at the expense of liberals and greenswhile the Socialists and Democrats (S&D) remained relatively stableThe recent victories of the Social Democrats in Germany, Franceand the UKEuropean liberals have been doing some soul-searching — a theme that has shaped the debates on the The Progressive Governance Summit of Das Progressive Zentrumwhich I attended this year in Berlin, Germany.

In our hemisphere, populist progressives are surfing a renewed wave of success, securing historic victories in Colombia, Brazil and Chile – often against formidable, authoritarian oriented opponents. The elected president of Mexico Claudia Sheinbaum, who campaigned on a platform of working-class empowerment, recently won a historic supermajority.

Globally, the populist left has proven to be the most effective opponent of a mobilized right, and this is no different in Canada. I see this where I live in southwestern Ontario, where the same voters can vote Conservative in one election, then turn around and vote New Democrats at the municipal level.

This left-right swing dynamic was also evident in former NDP leader Jack Layton’s impressive 2011 campaign, which I worked on. In Toronto, a third of voters who voted for the NDP in 2011 had already voted for Rob Ford for mayor in 2010. Voters are real people — complex and prone to swinging — very different from the rigid political identities within the Ottawa bubble that would undoubtedly be perplexed.

As we look ahead to the next federal election, any serious progressive opposition should study the key constituencies where the Conservatives are looking to win new seats. These are places where people feel forgotten — outside metro Toronto, affluent Vancouver and urban Montreal. They are constituencies with Liberal MPs, where the excitement over Justin Trudeau in 2015 has shrunk as quickly as their family budgets. These voters want a new government that will meet their needs. For many, that alternative will not be a rebranded Trudeau or his Liberal Party, long seen as the political establishment, or in the words of Jagmeet Singh, “obligated to the interests of the business community.”

The NDP can more credibly present itself as that alternative. They can point to the gains that Singh has secured for working-class people with the deal and the stability of one of the longest minority governments in Canadian history: coverage for diabetes medication will be a life changing victory when rolled out, dental care for 2.3 million Canadians children and seniors, and that the federal government is finally getting back to work build new houses in cities across Canada and of course legislation against strikebreakers.

Now that the NDP is no longer part of the agreement, it can focus on its historical roots: standing up for the working class against corporate profit-seeking and laissez-faire government.

Now that prices are rising and supermarkets are being boycotted, the NDP should reconsider its position. to suggest that protect people from predictable shocks: Price limits for essential groceries and removing political influence from the Competition Bureau. While the supermarket giants undoubtedly continue to influence To push conservatives and liberals to do nothing, the NDP could take a cue from Kamala Harris, who resonates with working-class American voters by calling for an end to excessive prices in supermarkets.

It’s a winning strategy. The same dynamic applies to workers’ rights. When push comes to shove, the Liberals have joined the Conservatives in unions fight for wages equal to the cost of living. Not to mention the ongoing scandal of the industry-controlled Temporary Foreign Worker Program, a conservative legacy program that the Liberals have rejected despite migrant workers itself, Canadian unions and international observers to call the shameless exploitation of workers and the distortion of the labor market. Even if the NDP’s principled positions do not immediately become reality, they offer working people a clear contrast — who is fighting for you, and who is not.

Trudeau’s promised “Sunny Ways” are gone, replaced by working-class anger. Poilievre has been great at harnessing people’s frustrations, but his free-market ideology is at odds with solving the inflationary crises that the market has created. Consumption taxes are a fraction of the cost and not the root problem. People’s hopes will be misplaced if Poilievre wins, because there will be no salvation when it comes to the price of groceries, housing and energy.

I hope this marks a new beginning in what could be a necessary long game to present a viable alternative to Poilievre’s Conservatives. It is possible to do it.

Jagmeet Singh can win over working class by exposing Conservative leader populist agenda. With its roots in class politics and its geographically diverse bases of support in northern, industrial and prairie seats, the NDP is well positioned to be the best bet to challenge these Conservative-leaning constituencies.

The Liberal Party has long positioned itself as the “natural party of government,” but Canada’s establishment has broken its social contract with the working class. There is an uprising underway, and it is global. The destructive “burn-it-all-down” far right can only be effectively countered by traditional social democrats who have always offered a genuine alternative to the status quo.

Jen Hassum is Executive Director of the Broadbent Institute.