Issues

Let's make it clear that Canada can and must be much more than a resource colony for our neighbour. Add your name if you agree.

Right now Canadians are being gouged at the supermarket cash register by a small group of corporations that act like a cartel – jacking up prices, and deploying “shrinkflation” to sell us less for more. They’ve also been caught in a series of scandals - from “Tatergate", a class action lawsuit in the US against Canadian potato corporations price-fixing Tater Tots (is nothing sacred?) to Loblaws and others charging us for the packaging on meat. For years.

The simple answer is price caps for food, an NDP policy that was successfully implemented in France just last year. With the cost of living about to shoot up again, we must prevent price gouging by Canada’s corporate grocery magnates.

We also need windfall profit taxes for corporations that are price-fixing in the midst of a cost-of-living emergency.

And ultimately, we need to break up these virtual monopolies - either by giving the Competition Bureau the tools to actually rein in greedy corporations, or by introducing a public option for groceries - a public, non-profit supermarket model. Nothing would get prices down faster than some real competition in the public interest!

Canada needs a People’s Power Line—a publicly owned East-West electricity grid that breaks our dependence on the US and powers every province with clean, affordable energy.

Instead of another taxpayer-funded pipeline for Big Oil, we must invest in true energy independence and a nation-building project that serves the people, not polluters.

Add your name and call for a national East-West electricity grid now.

Vancouver Centre has some of the highest rents in the country. But this housing crisis didn’t just happen—it was designed. Corporate landlords and financial giants are gobbling up homes, driving rents sky-high and pushing people out of the communities they love.

This is a rigged game—and it’s time to flip the board.

We need bold federal action to fight back and build a housing system rooted in care, not profit. That means:

• National rent control to stop the gouging
• A Tenants’ Bill of Rights to protect people, not profits
• A massive investment in non-profit, public, and co-op housing, and
• A ban on the sale of affordable apartment buildings to corporate landlords

Housing is a human right. And it’s time our federal government acted like it.

Will you sign?

Add your name to demand a housing system that puts people before profit—and let’s build the political power to make it real.

It's time to finish the job. Add your name to support universal, public health care, from head to toe.

Trump’s economic war is ours to win—if we ditch the corporate playbook and think big

(Originally Published in the Breach March 7, 2025)



Canada is under economic attack by our closest neighbour—and to meet this historic moment, we need big, bold ideas.

As Donald Trump’s on-again, off-again tariffs batter Canada’s economy, now is the time for a vigorous debate about the transformative policies we need from the federal government to fight back.

Instead, the national conversation has been plagued by a staggering lack of political imagination.

Our news feeds seem like they’re written by lobbyists for big corporations intent on seizing the crisis for more mega-profits: slashing government programs for people or reviving zombie pipelines and megaprojects that were buried long ago due to concerns for the environment and Indigenous rights.

But this is also our crisis to seize. If our opponents have their ideas ready and waiting, so do we.

On our side, we have policies that leverage the power of the federal government to actually solve the emergencies we face: from our economic dependence on the U.S. to the cost of living disaster that a tariff war would deepen, the deep corporate control over every sector of our economy, and the existential threat of the climate unraveling.

It was Milton Friedman, the grandfather of neoliberal shock therapy, who once said, “Only a crisis—actual or perceived—produces real change. When that crisis occurs, the actions that are taken depend on the ideas that are lying around.”

And right now, we have many inspiring ideas lying around—thanks to progressive wonks who’ve kept them alive in think tanks and policy shops, waiting for a political moment like this to create the space for bold government action.

This is a true look-in-the-mirror moment for Canada: a chance not only to protect people from the coming onslaught but also to right the scales of society.

Food fightback: Breaking the grocery cartel

Amnesty International has called the conditions facing temporary foreign workers in sectors like agriculture and food processing “shocking abuse and discrimination.” Photo: Shutterstock

Ten bucks for butter? Apples $2 each?

Canadians are being gouged at the supermarket cash register by a handful of corporations that act like a cartel, jacking up prices and using “shrinkflation” to sell less for more.

They’ve also been caught in a series of scandals, from “Tatergate“—a class-action lawsuit in the U.S. against Canadian potato corporations for price-fixing—to Loblaws and others charging for the packaging on meat, for years.

The simple answer is price caps on food staples, an NDP policy that was successfully implemented in France just last year. With the cost of living about to shoot up again, we must prevent price gouging by Canada’s corporate grocery magnates.

We also need windfall profit taxes for grocery giants that are price-fixing in the midst of a cost-of-living emergency, so that we can reinvest those revenues in food security.

Ultimately, we need to break up these virtual monopolies—either by giving the Competition Bureau the tools to actually rein in greedy corporations, or by introducing a public option for groceries: a public, non-profit supermarket model. Nothing would bring prices down faster than real competition in the public interest.

And while we’re all ironing our flags and searching out Canadian-grown food, it’s long past time to remember who keeps the food system running: migrant farmworkers.

Fruits, vegetables, meat, wine, flowers—all are harvested by migrants, many earning poverty wages, facing abuse, and denied basic rights. Amnesty International calls the conditions “shocking abuse and discrimination.”

Supporting local Canadian food means standing with the workers who make it possible—starting with full immigration status for all.

Public transit for the public good

Right now, transportation is the second-largest source of greenhouse gas emissions in Canada. In many dense urban areas, people are stuck fuming in their cars or suffering a daily stress-filled public transit nightmare on the way to work.

But the federal government has no plan to boost public and active transportation. What’s more, it has prioritized funding shiny capital projects over investing in transit operations, leading to 1,700 buses sitting idle across the country.

We need a massive expansion in public transit everywhere.

The federal government should spark a made-in-Canada electric bus boom, vastly improving the convenience and ridership of public transit while slashing emissions and creating a surge in manufacturing jobs.

For less than $3 billion a year over the next 12 years, we could pave the way for an E-bus revolution, while doubling transit use by 2035.

It’s not rocket science. With just a fraction of the $50 billion in corporate welfare and financing Canada poured into the TMX pipeline, we could be in the electric bus express lane.

Instead of another bailout for U.S.-based Big Auto, we can have a bailout for Canadian auto workers, commuters, and the climate. And with steelworkers facing a first-and-worst tariff attack, this is a great solution for our steel industry, too.

A new report suggests Canada could double transit ridership for less than $3 billion a year over the next 12 years. Photo: BYD Colombia/Wikimedia Commons

Care and repair: Paying childcare workers what they deserve

The $10-a-day child care plan was one progressive promise the federal Liberals actually moved on, thanks to decades of pressure from the NDP and the grassroots.

But the promise is still out of reach for too many working families across the country, who are left dangling on waiting lists or paying exorbitant amounts.

That’s because despite the framework legislation, federal funding, and provincial agreements, the Liberals failed to value one key element of the system: the workers. They should have required that provinces implement a fair wage grid, but they did not.

Now there’s a desperate shortage of childcare workers—and, as a result, programs are struggling to operate at full capacity and families are still paying way more than they should.

In B.C., child care advocates have found that a competitive starting wage of $30 to $40 per hour is what’s needed to attract and retain staff.

Research has shown that investments in this sector of the economy not only save Canadians money but also have tremendous positive implications for childhood development—to our profound collective benefit.

Child care is a key pillar of an economy based on care, and it’s a core Canadian value—worth protecting and strengthening in this time of economic crisis brought on by U.S. aggression.

The solution to homelessness is…homes

Homelessness is a glaring sign of the moral failure of our economy.

But it also lights up the irrationality of our system: rather than paying for more cops or emergency care, it’s cheaper to simply invest in supportive housing that ensures people have a stable place to live.

That’s where the “Housing First” model comes in. The approach offers rent allowances to move people experiencing chronic homelessness directly into permanent housing, and it provides them with intensive support—from mental health to addiction treatment to life skills and other forms of care—to help them succeed in this transition.

A Canadian research study found that the Housing First project had an 85 per cent success rate in getting homeless individuals into stable housing.

We have a model that has proven to work, but it’s never been tried at scale, with full resources.

The federal government is the only level of government with the financial resources to step up and solve a socio-economic health and housing problem like this. It’s long past time.

With an east-west power grid, we could invest in true energy independence, create good union jobs, and lower power bills. Photo: Gordon Hunter/Flickr

Power lines, not pipelines

This is not the time to abandon climate-safe policies—it’s the time to finally get serious.

The short-term and long-term benefits of a renewable economy far outweigh reviving zombie projects that depend on endless extraction.

That old thinking only benefits the multinational corporations—often U.S.-based—that already own much of our resources, deepening Canada’s dependence on exports, most of which head south.

Canadian sovereignty and safety aren’t served by doubling down on 19th century energy. They’re best served by accelerating the transition to a clean economy.

The moment is ripe to Build Baby Build.

Here’s a great idea lying around: a 21st century, high-efficiency, publicly-owned electricity grid to anchor a massive build-out of made-in-Canada solar and wind energy.

With a People’s Power Line, we could invest in true energy independence, create good union jobs, and lower power bills.

We need massive federal investments that don’t pour profits into the gas tank of extractive industries and the banks that finance them, but shift the landscape of our economy to one based on care and repair for land and people.

Here’s the thing—and I’m sorry to have to repeat what the world’s top scientists have been saying, or screaming, for years: we have to get off fossil fuels as fast as humanly possible.

No more extensions. No more magical thinking about carbon capture and get-out-of-pollution free cards. We’ve run out of second and third and 44th chances.

Had we started gently weaning ourselves off the biggest source of emissions in the 1990s, we could have done it in stages. But we didn’t.

Now we need to change course immediately—without extending the fossil fuel era by the lifespan of a single new pipeline.

We now face a series of cascading, linked emergencies: from the cost-of-living crisis to the lack of housing, exploding homelessness and hunger, crumbling infrastructure, and chaotic public health and education systems.

But we can do this. We can walk and chew gum, reduce emissions while addressing inequality, re-invest in the public while reining in corporate power.

In the language of wonks everywhere: We can multi-solve in a polycrisis.

A game-changer for Indigenous and climate justice

One powerful solution to the moral and material crisis facing our country is the call to unleash Indigenous-owned renewable energy projects.

Indigenous communities and businesses are already leading the charge on clean energy development in Canada. One-fifth of all renewable energy projects in the country have Indigenous owners or partners, contributing to both decarbonization and decolonization. But these projects are often underfunded and lack regulatory support.

There’s an extra piece that could make this even more powerful. The Liberal government has failed to make the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP) the law of the land, despite committing to it in legislation. But just one principle from that famous document could be a game-changer: enshrining the legal principle of Free, Prior, and Informed Consent (FPIC) for Indigenous communities over industrial projects that take place on their lands.

To put it simply, if FPIC was made Canadian law, Indigenous rights would finally gain equal legal standing with the massive power of corporations to extract value from the land.

That balancing of the scales would do more for Indigenous and climate justice than any arcane market mechanism, Net Zero pledge, or symbolic commitment to reconciliation

Breaking the stranglehold of the Tech Broligarchs

To fight Trump, we need a plan to address the power of Big Tech and the budding bromance between the U.S. President and tech billionaires. Photo: Gage Skidmore/Wikimedia Commons.

With the sudden bromance between Trumpian populists and tech billionaires, we need a fightback plan to address the power of Big Tech in our lives.

It is troubling to see the spread of the tech broligarchs to Canada—a new generation of tech billionaires trying to push the country to the right. This is the grotesque evolution of the neoliberal project taken to extremes of surveillance and exploitation.

One key policy solution is creating a public option for AI, to provide a counterbalance to the monopolistic control that tech giants have over critical technologies.

A public AI option could help ensure that these technologies serve the public good rather than just corporate interests—and that artists, news organizations, and other creators actually get paid and have their unique work protected in the big datasets that AI relies on.

We also need to invest in domestic digital alternatives that reduce our reliance on U.S.-dominated tech infrastructure and protect users from the unchecked power of these tech giants.

Canada could also hit back by asserting its sovereignty over intellectual property.

By exercising our power under international and Canadian law to suspend patents held by U.S.-controlled companies, we could reduce the flow of money to U.S. companies—including tech giants.

This would also free up Canadian companies to unlock significant advancements and discoveries while keeping more of the wealth and innovation here at home.

Finally, we could heed the call for a global race to the top—where we compete with other countries to capture the profit margins of U.S. Big Tech. By making Canada a hub for digital self-determination, we could legalize practices like jailbreaking iPhones, Teslas, and John Deere tractors, and bypassing digital paywalls that tech companies bake into the products we buy.

From crisis to opportunity

Canada is at a crossroads. In the face of Trump’s brute force blow to the country’s economy, we can either double down on an extractive, corporate-driven economy that prioritizes profits over people, or we can seize this moment to build a new economy—one rooted in care for one another and for the earth.

This is our chance to advance an inspiring people-first vision and do big things in the public interest.

The ideas above were made for this moment. And there are many more out there with the same spirit: forward-looking ambition, paired with laser focus on actually solving the crises of everyday life—housing, health, transit, cost-of-living.

As my campaign has knocked well over 10,000 doors in Vancouver Centre, we’ve been testing these proposals day after day, in conversation with neighbours. And I can say this with confidence: Canadians are ready to do big things.

This is our moment. There’s no going back to a broken status quo when a much brighter future is ours to win.

 
Avi Lewis 
Your Vancouver Centre NDP Candidate