Federal NDP leader hosts Dartmouth event to end Atlantic tour

Federal NDP leader Avi Lewis ended his four-day tour of Atlantic Canada with an event in Dartmouth, N.S. on Sept. 29. 

Speaking to more than 200 people at the Zatzman Sportsplex, Lewis promoted NDP policies, criticized recent actions of Prime Minister Mark Carney and fundraised for the party. 

“Tonight was extraordinary,” says Lewis in an interview with the Dalhousie Gazette after the event. “It felt like a turning point to me.”

Lewis hosted events across every Atlantic province from Sept. 25 to 29.

At the event, Lewis spoke about the NDP’s policies to address the cost-of-living crisis, including providing a public option for grocery stores, alcohol and cannabis sales, cell service, internet and housing construction — the last of which he says could build millions of units.

Lewis said the turnout, which filled the event’s main room and most of an overflow room, proved the NDP “are not a party on life support.”

Lewis, a former journalist and activist who had never held public office, was elected leader in March after the NDP suffered their worst-ever performance in the 2025 election, winning seven seats.

Lewis says the Atlantic tour “was an important moment in the rebirth and rebuilding of the party because Atlantic Canadians are used to being taken for granted.”

“Atlantic Canada is ground zero for the cost of living crisis,” he says. “Our base is really strong here, even though we haven’t had a seat here in a while,” he says. 

“Our concrete proposals for addressing [the cost of living crisis] will resonate here like nowhere else because that emergency is felt so keenly here.”

The NDP hasn’t won a seat in Atlantic Canada since 2019, or in Nova Scotia since 2011. Since the last election, a resignation and a floor-crossing have reduced the NDP to five MPs, with the closest to the East Coast being in Winnipeg.

“If you’re a party that has been reduced by an epic defeat to single-digit members, you are not going to have seats everywhere,” says Lewis, adding that the NDP’s loss is part of a longer descent in successive elections since 2011.

After the event, Lewis attended a Pints and Politics gathering at a local bar organized by the Nova Scotia Young New Democrats.

Linnea Löfström-Abary, co-chair of Canada’s Young New Democrats and of Nova Scotia Young New Democrats, says Lewis’s event was “very inspiring.”

“He hits the nail on the head every time. He’s really the type of guy where what you see is what you get, and that shows a lot in how he speaks,” she says.

Löfström-Abary, also the president of the University of King’s College’s NDP and a sociology student, says the party has been “much more responsive to the youth wing” since Lewis took over. 

“I’m excited to see what the next election brings for us, especially in Halifax.”

Multiple speakers went before Lewis including Melissa Marsman, president of the Nova Scotia Federation of Labour, and Lina Hamid, the NDP MLA for the Halifax riding of Fairview-Clayton Park.

“The exact same vision that Avi Lewis is bringing to people across the country [is] right here in Dartmouth tonight, a vision that gives people real hope and reason to organize and to fight,” said Hamid.

Lewis also spoke about Bill C-39, proposed Liberal legislation that would reduce review for major projects and allow the federal labour minister to order a striking union back to work.

“The prime minister has a certain amount of rope, and he’s using it to do really extreme things,” Lewis says. “But when Canadians realize what he’s prepared to sacrifice in favour of this agenda, he could face a massive backlash, and we need to be the party that’s opposed to it at every stage.”