Jagmeet Singh seeks to hold Prairie seats as election campaign enters homestretch
NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh is spending some of the final days of the federal election campaign in NDP-held Prairie cities that could be under threat, as Winnipeg candidates debate the balance between free speech and religious freedom.
Singh was campaigning Thursday in Winnipeg — where the party holds two seats – a day after visiting Edmonton, home to two other NDP MPs.
Winnipeg polling firm Probe Research reported Thursday that the NDP has been trailing the Liberals and Conservatives in Winnipeg since February — but a recent recovery in the party's popularity could see it hold both seats in the city as well as a third seat in northern Manitoba.
'With the NDP at risk of losing many seats elsewhere, retaining a Manitoba beachhead could be very important as the party seeks to rebuild following a difficult campaign,' says the polling firm's analysis.
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Singh sought to strike a positive tone Thursday, saying New Democrats have pushed for real change at the federal level. He cited the new dental care program and the completion of a pharmacare agreement with Manitoba in February which will see Ottawa pay for diabetes medication and contraceptives.
'These three New Democrats delivered far more than all the Conservative MPs in this province combined,' Singh told reporters.
On a two-day campaign stop in Edmonton on Tuesday, Singh joined former Alberta NDP premier Rachel Notley to argue that Alberta Premier Danielle Smith's United Conservative government offers a preview of the sort of divisive, American-style politics the federal Conservatives would bring to Ottawa.
On his Thursday stop in Winnipeg, Singh appeared alongside local candidate Jorge Requena Ramos, who has taken Liberal incumbent Ben Carr to task over calls for 'bubble zones' that would limit how close protests can come to sites like Jewish community centres and mosques.
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The NDP supports these bubble zones and presented a successful House motion last November calling for 'protective bubble zones at places of worship' following heated protests over the Israel-Hamas war. But Ramos said these zones should not apply to sites that are being used for political speech.
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He was reacting to Carr saying it was inappropriate for supporters of Palestinian rights to protest on April 1 outside a Jewish community centre hosting a talk by two Israeli soldiers about their time in the Gaza Strip.
'I fully support bubble zones where they are necessary to protect our Charter rights. That includes the right to worship in a safe place of worship. I also believe in the freedom of peaceful expression, including outside a political event at a community centre,' Ramos wrote in a media statement.
Ramos, along with the Winnipeg South Centre candidates from the Communist and Green parties, wrote a letter to Carr demanding he meet them publicly to clarify his stance on 'bubble zones.'
The three were also named in flyers posted around the Winnipeg South Centre riding telling voters not to cast a ballot for Carr, accusing him of vocally opposing Palestine.
The NDP says Ramos only learned of those flyers Thursday.
Ramos took Carr to task for suggesting the April 1 protest was 'completely unacceptable' because it happened at a site housing a Jewish school and daycare.
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Carr said he's open to a healthy debate on bubble zones but argued his opponents are 'conflating' reasonable limits on speech with an erosion of Charter rights.
'The point is that there are children who go to school and daycare, and to access community services in the building where the protest took place,' he said. 'And I think that it is reasonable to put protections in place to ensure that they are not subject to those demonstrations.'
Carr said it was 'perplexing' that the NDP 'was choosing to align itself with the Communist Party of Canada, given what we know about the way that communist-led dictatorships around the world, throughout history, have treated freedom of expression,' Carr said. 'The irony is certainly not lost on me.'
The NDP said it does not have control over who supports its positions.
Singh, meanwhile, focused again on the U.S. on Thursday, saying health care, environmental regulations, labour and treaty rights must be kept off the table when new trade talks begin with Washington.
He said the NDP will fight to protect these interests when trade negotiations between the new government and U.S. President Donald Trump's administration begin shortly after the election on Monday.
Singh's late campaign message to Canadians is a call for more New Democrats in the House of Commons to pressure a Mark Carney-led Liberal government on progressive priorities.
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The NDP leader has said Ottawa works best when one party doesn't hold all the power.
–with files from The Canadian Press' David Baxter
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