Avi Lewis’s decisive victory in the NDP leadership race may signal the return of a clearer ideological divide on Canada’s political left.
Lewis won the party’s leadership on the first ballot on March 29, taking 56 per cent of the nearly 71,000 votes cast.
Lewis takes the helm at a fragile time for the party. The NDP lost official party status after being reduced to seven seats in the 2025 election, recently lost one MP to the Liberals, and looks poised to lose their sole Quebec MP to provincial politics.
Some observers say Lewis nonetheless has a strong opportunity to rebuild the party as the NDP and the Liberals move farther apart.
“Prime Minister Carney governs a lot more in line with what we would maybe call in simple terms a progressive conservative,” said Matthew Dubé, a former NDP MP who represented the Quebec riding of Beloeil—Chambly from 2011 until 2019.
“It’s easier for the NDP to draw that distinction [from the Liberals now], and it’s perhaps more important than ever to occupy space on the progressive side of the political spectrum.”
A Liberal-NDP coalition
In recent years, one of the NDP’s primary electoral problems was that many voters had trouble distinguishing it from the Liberals.
Canadian political scientist Matthew McManus says this was partly the product of political convergence from both directions: Justin Trudeau moved the Liberals left, while Jagmeet Singh moved the NDP to the centre.
“In the aftermath of [former leader] Jack Layton’s passing, it became increasingly difficult to ideologically define what the role of the NDP was supposed to be in Canadian politics,” said McManus, who is an assistant professor of politics at Spelman College in the U.S.
“And I think that was compounded by the fact that, functionally if not in fact, there was a coalition between the [Liberals and NDP] for the better part of the last electoral cycle,” McManus said, referring to the 2022 confidence-and-supply agreement that saw the NDP commit to supporting the minority Liberals in exchange for policy concessions.
The result, McManus says, was that progressive voters would often “drift towards the Liberals since they’re … the more practical electoral alternative to the Conservatives.”
“I think it’s very clear in hindsight that this choice was a disaster [for the NDP],” McManus said.
For his part, Dubé gives the NDP credit for exploring “collective solutions” to problems.
He also notes the confidence-and-supply agreement can be considered a success for pushing the Trudeau government to expand dental care and pharmacare.
But Dubé notes the political environment has changed dramatically since then. The political gulf between the Liberals and NDP — particularly under Lewis — makes another such agreement unlikely.
Lewisology
Lewis has proposed an aggressively interventionist economic agenda, including public grocery stores, a network of public telecom providers and rent controls.
His campaign platform also said “the market is failing us” and called for “a new generation of public corporations” to make life more affordable.
On climate and energy policies, Lewis is far left of the Carney Liberals.
He campaigned against new fossil fuel infrastructure, a position that provincial New Democrats in Alberta and Saskatchewan were quick to condemn.
On the day of Lewis’ win, Alberta NDP Leader Naheed Nenshi said on social media that the direction of the federal party under Lewis is “not in the interests of Alberta.”
That same day, Saskatchewan NDP Leader Carla Beck published a letter calling Lewis’ views on resource development “ideological” and “unrealistic.” She warned that they put at risk 40,000 jobs and $13.6-billion in annual economic activity in the province.
Under Carney, by contrast, the Liberals have dropped some of their more unpopular environmental and energy policies, including the consumer carbon tax and opposition to pipelines and resource development.
Lewis is also carving out a very distinct position from the Liberals on foreign policy.
Under Carney, the Liberals have dramatically boosted defence spending, and unveiled a defence industrial strategy that will see tens of billions poured into defence production in the coming years.
Lewis has questioned these investments and jobs strategy.
“I’m not saying you don’t need a military,” Lewis said at a March 5 campaign event in Ottawa. “We need a military. But this is not the way.”
Lewis has also consistently taken the side of Palestine since the Oct. 7, 2023 Hamas attacks on Israel, whereas the Liberals have tried to strike a centrist position.
“When Israel commits genocide in Gaza, we call it by its name and we do everything in our power to bring it to an end,” Lewis said during his leadership victory speech.
More recently, Carney has offered tepid support for the U.S.-Israeli strikes on Iran, while Lewis has been highly critical of them and Carney’s statements.
“When the U.S. and Israel start an illegal and reprehensible war against Iran that sets the world on fire, we say: Canada should have absolutely no role in it whatsoever,” he said in his leadership victory speech.
The electoral test
Now that Lewis is leader, the work of rebuilding the party begins.
The NDP is unlikely to face a general election soon, as the Liberals look likely to secure the two seats they need for a majority in three by-elections on April 13.
Dubé says this could be a “blessing in disguise” for the NDP, as it would provide them time to fundraise, organize and rebuild.
But he thinks Lewis should be trying to win a seat in Parliament soon.
Lewis has run twice, unsuccessfully, for federal seats. He told reporters at a rally in late March that he had no plans to run in the April 13 by-elections.
Some pundits have speculated he could run in a by-election in Toronto’s Beaches—East York riding if incumbent Liberal MP Nate Erskine-Smith steps down to run for the provincial Liberals.
“It’s a seat, demographically, that could be well suited for the NDP, particularly under [Lewis’] leadership, and one that we’ve held before,” said Dubé.
Dubé says Lewis’ presence in the House of Commons would be a key part of the party re-establishing credibility.
“[Being in Parliament] gives you an opportunity to interact with the facets of politics that are closer to governing,” he said.
But he also noted that success for the NDP is about more than winning seats. It’s about shaping public debate.
And in his view, Lewis has the bold ideas to do this.
“The one theme that struck me from Avi Lewis’s leadership campaign was the word ‘bold’,” Dubé said. “Bold ideas.
“And I think that’s what you’re gonna hear a lot from him, trying to bring that to the electorate and, you know, at minimum to stoke a public debate on what the right solutions to these issues are. …
“[I]f you can push the public debate in a direction that’s in keeping with those ideas, I think the party will see that as a success in the short and medium term.”
