NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh started his election campaign with a press conference in downtown Ottawa, saying he’s the right candidate to look after the interests of everyday Canadians.
Singh accused the Liberals and Conservatives of looking out for the interests of the rich and big corporations, and said it was the NDP who fought for universal health care and union bargaining power in Canada.
Singh also referred to Donald Trump’s tariffs on Canada, saying his party is the best to deal with the U.S. president.
Given the NDP’s declining polling numbers, with some polls showing support for the party in the single digits, Singh, who became leader in 2017, was asked at the press conference why he thinks he is the right person to lead the NDP into a third campaign.
Singh noted that it was his party that pushed the Liberal government to bring in dental care and pharmacare programs under the supply-and-confidence agreement the NDP had with the Trudeau Liberals, and that it is he who will fight for Canadians.
“I want folks to know in this time when there are serious threats to our country, we know that the other guys aren’t in it for you,” he said.
The following is the text of Singh’s March 23 campaign speech.
Before we begin, I want to acknowledge that we are gathered on the traditional and unceded territory of the Algonquin Anishinaabe people. This land has been home to indigenous people since time immemorial, and we recognize their enduring presence, culture, and stewardship of these lands. We commit ourselves to reconciliation and justice, not just in words, but in action.
And I want to take a moment to recognize some of the incredible people in this room, our dedicated volunteers, our team. Thank you so much our candidates, who are ready to fight for you.
And most importantly, you, the people who make this country great. Thank you. My parents chose Canada because they believed in the promise of a country where if you worked hard, you can build a good life, where we'd look out for one another and no one gets left behind. That’s who we are. That’s what makes us Canadian.
The things that we are most proud of as Canadians didn’t just happen. They were not gifts from the powerful. New Democrats fought for them because we believe that if you get sick, you get care. So we fought for and won universal health care.
Because no one, no one, should go bankrupt trying to pay a hospital bill. We believe that if you’ve worked hard all your life you should be able to retire with dignity. So we fought for and won pensions.
We believe that you have the right to join a union so you can demand fairness and stand up to the boss. So we fought for those rights and we won.
We believe that whoever you are, whether you were born here or you came here, whatever the colour of your skin, whoever you love, what pronouns you use, however you worship, or what you believe, you belong, you are valued, and you have every right to everything this country has to offer you.
These are NDP values. These are Canadian values. That’s the Canada I love, and that’s the Canada worth fighting for.
And when the New Democrats are elected, that’s exactly what we do. Even before Donald Trump started his greedy trade war, times were tough, and we fought to make things better for you and your family.
Paid sick days and laws to protect you at work, that was us, dental care, so you don’t have to choose between living in pain and buying groceries. That was us. Pharmacare so you can afford the medicine your doctor prescribes. That was us, because we believe that the promise of Canada belongs to all of us.
Let me tell you a story of Brianna. Brianna is a mom that I met in Edmonton. I met her in a park with her beautiful family. She’s got five kids, single mom, and so she is struggling. So this is all she could do, is to keep the roof over her head, to support her kids, and put food on the table. And so as a mom, she had to make some sacrifices. She had to make some tough choices. And one of the things that she had to do, given how expensive things are, and she could not afford to take her kids to the dentist, and she felt a lot of mom guilt.
It’s a feeling that a lot of parents understand, that feeling that you’re not doing everything you can to take care of your kids. And so she felt that guilt, until we fought for and delivered dental care for kids. That dental care meant the difference for her family, the first time that they saw a dentist was because of that plan we fought for, and she told me that her eldest actually turned out to have a rare condition that they caught early, and now he’s going to have an awesome life.
Her other kids were able to get dental care for the first time in their lives, and they’re happier and healthier. And I can attest to that because I saw them in that park smiling and playing. I can remember that look of joy on their faces and that feeling that Brianna had, knowing that she had been able to take care of her kids. Brianna is who we fight for, and we will keep fighting for her and every Canadian
But today, that promise of a great future is slipping further and further away. I hear it everywhere I go. A mother sitting at her kitchen table, bills spread out in front of her, wondering if she can pay the rent or still afford groceries. A young couple scrolling through listings realizing that owning a home is slipping further out of reach. A senior without a family doctor waiting for the health care they need.
And now because of Donald Trump’s illegal trade war, things are getting even more expensive. Thousands of Canadians are losing their jobs. The people who built this country are paying the greatest price, and that’s not fair. They deserve a government that has their backs. You deserve a government that has your back, and we will fight like hell to make sure that happens.
You deserve a prime minister you can trust to make decisions in your best interest, not to advance his personal wealth. And we know that someone who is going to be fighting in your best interest, that’s not Mark Carney. He has spent his whole career serving the interests of billionaires, of shareholders and CEOs. He makes decisions that benefit people like him. He’s not our guy, because anyone who profits off the crisis should not be in charge of fixing it.
Right now, the people who built this country, the folks without multimillion-dollar portfolios, without blind trust or hedge funds, the people who earn their living by showing up to work, who dream of owning a home, raising a family, and retiring with a modest pension, they’re being abandoned.
Mark Carney spent his career making sure the system worked for the most wealthy, not for you. While families struggled to pay rent, he was helping banks and investors profit off the housing crisis. When people needed relief, he made sure corporations driving up prices kept raking in profits. He cashed in while Canadians were struggling. Now he wants you to believe he'll fix the very things that made him and his friends richer. He won’t fight for everyday people, because that’s not who he is, and that won’t change now.
And Pierre Poilievre, his only solution is tax breaks for the wealthy, and that will cost you. He pretends he’s on your side, but in the back rooms he’s cutting deals with the very billionaires jacking up your rent and groceries.
He posed in front of workers who had just lost their jobs, and he said nothing about fixing EI to help them pay the bills. Pierre Poilievre talks about freedom, but he’s only offering freedom for the ultra rich, freedom for corporations to jack up your rent, freedom for billionaires to avoid paying taxes, freedom for big corporations to buy up our health care, where he has promised to make deep cuts, making wait times even longer, pushing more people into private, for-profit clinics.
He wants to gut environmental protections, handing more control to big polluters who profit, who put profits ahead of clean air and water. He would strip away supports that help Canadians make ends meet, forcing families to fend for themselves while billionaires get even richer. When times get tougher, he won’t step in. He'll step aside. That’s not leadership, that’s not a plan that will build a Canada we can be proud of.
Let me be perfectly clear, we will never be Trump’s 51st state, not in name, not in values, not ever. Elbows up everybody!
And I won’t let anyone in this election tell Canadians that the only way to beat Donald Trump is to become more like his version of the United States, where billionaires rule and everyday people pay.
Now, I get it right now, it can feel like a storm is closing in on us. People are looking for shelter, for protection, for someone, to keep them and their families safe, people who are afraid a Pierre Poilievre government might make them think they have no choice but Carney. But this is like being told you have to pick between a leaky house—a house with a leaky roof, or a cracked foundation. One patched together with empty Conservative slogans, the other rotting from the inside after years of Liberals protecting the most wealthy. Now those houses are not the same, but neither will hold up when the storm hits, because neither was built for you.
People will tell you in this election that it’s about who can negotiate with Donald Trump. I’m here to tell you the real question is, who will make sure you and the things that you care about are not on the table when Donald Trump comes demanding concessions? Who will say no to trading away Canadian jobs or the things we grow and build and ship? Who will stop them from bargaining with environmental protections just to protect corporate profits? Who will fight back when Mark Carney says we have to cut health care or pensions to keep investors happy, who will stand up? When Pierre Poilievre says you have to accept an American-style health care system where you pay more, also you can give tax breaks to billionaires only, New Democrats can be trusted to look out for you.
Donald Trump is showing us in real time what happens when billionaires and the people who work for them are in charge. Everything gets more expensive, rights get stripped away, and regular people are left to clean up the mess while the wealthy walk away richer. We don’t need that here in Canada. We don’t need that at all.
We all know that we’re in for a rough road ahead. Things are already tough, and at the end of the day, only New Democrats will fight to make sure you don’t pay the price when things get harder.
I’m running in this election to fight for you, not the billionaires. New Democrats have a strong and proud record of getting things done when prices skyrocketed. We fought for relief when people were laid off. We fought for jobs and better support when corporate greed ran wild, we went after the billionaires like Galen Weston, Elon Musk, and Jeff Bezos, because when families are struggling, when your job and livelihood is on the line, when prices are soaring, New Democrats choose you every time.
The wealthy and powerful will never hand us change. They have too much to lose. Each victory for Canadians, for families, and for working and middle-class people, from pensions to public health care, was won because people like you fought for it.
Billionaires don’t stay rich by playing fair. They don’t wake up one morning and decide to stop gouging you at the grocery store, they don’t just decide to lower your rent or to raise your wages. That only happens when we demand it, when we fight for it, and when we win.
Do not let the rich and powerful tell you that you deserve less. Do not let them convince you that in a time of crisis, you must sacrifice while they profit, because when the storm hits, they won’t feel it. They'll have golden parachutes, private clinics, and tax shelters.
But for working and middle-class families, the only way life gets better is by standing together and electing leaders who will fight for you, not for the billionaires. That’s what this election is about. That’s what is at stake. We see what’s happening in the U.S. Greed is tearing it apart, and those same forces are banging at our door. We can and we must fight back.
We’re not here to patch up a broken system for the next storm. We are here to rebuild it stronger, safer, and fairer for everyone. I believe that’s worth fighting for. You are worth fighting for, and I’m in it for you.
Thank you so much.
