Federal NDP leader Avi Lewis addressed a group of local supporters during a visit to the Brantford and District Labour Centre on Saturday, October 31, 2026.
The stop in Brantford marked one of several southwestern Ontario locations Lewis has visited recently, having spoken to residents and workers in Hamilton, Guelph, Windsor, and Peel Region along his travels.
The visit comes ahead of an upcoming by-election after Larry Brock, former Conservative MP for Brantford-Brant South, announced his resignation effective earlier this year on September 18.
Though the election had yet to be called at the time of Lewis’ stop, Prime Minister Mark Carney officially announced that Brantford-Brant South and five other ridings in Ontario, Quebec and Saskatchewan would head to the polls on December 7, 2026.
Lewis said during his visit that in a moment of Canadian politics where a lot of big things are going on at the same time, that the NDP will remain dialed in.
“The NDP, federally as well as provincially, is staying laser focused on the everyday emergency of just trying to get by in a country where people are working harder and harder, and falling further and further behind. The social contract has been shredded in this country. It used to be that if you worked your butt off, you could afford a dignified life, and that your kids would have better opportunities than you did. That is over now,” he told attendees. “The past 50 years of economic policy has created untold wealth for the richest in society. There has never been more wealth being made in Canada, and none of it is trickling down to the working class of this country, who is working too hard. It is the entire structure of the Canadian economy that is making life impossible for the working class majority. We are the party of workers, and we will never stop fighting for a decent life for people, but we need big changes in this country in order to win it.”
Turning to the local by-election, Lewis said that the division of the Conservative vote, with Brantford Mayor Kevin Davis running as the party’s candidate and Dave Carrol running as an Independent, presents an opportunity for the NDP to make gains in Brantford-Brant.
“We can win this riding because the Tory vote is split and the mask is coming off the Liberal project in Canada, and we New Democrats know we are the only progressive party in Ottawa today. We need an NDP government one day, and that starts by winning by-elections. Getting back our party status is not going to happen all at once, but it can start right here in Brantford,” he said. “…I think our momentum is a little under the radar right now, but as a person with the privilege and the honour to go back and forth across this huge, beautiful county, meeting with our base, our base is on fire, and we’re ready to work.”
Lewis later told reporters that people are hungry for no-nonsense, straight-up progressive politics in Canada, saying that while the Liberal government and Carney are still high in the polls, he believes they’re not addressing the cost-of-living emergency and the crisis in working class life in Canada.
“The NDP are the only party that is advancing concrete, progressive solutions like a public option for groceries, cell phone and internet, like a national rent freeze, policies that are calling for a green industrial strategy to create tens of thousands of unionized jobs. We want to use Canadian steel in a 21st-century electricity grid, and build a heat pump industry to actually have an independent domestic economy that slashes people’s cost of living, reduces emissions and creates jobs at the same time,” he said. “ I think we’re offering a really clear alternative to what is emerging as the Carney agenda which is foreign investment, selling our natural resources, privatizing our airports, letting Ontario and Alberta privatize healthcare, and basically continuing an economic plan that is incredible for corporate Canada, and sucks for working people.”
He continued, “I think Canadians are really scared right now, and unfortunately, I feel like the Liberal government is taking advantage of that fear to push through a pretty radical pro-business agenda that is going to make a lot of money for a very small number of people but is not focused on the cost of living, which is the biggest emergency that we’re actually facing. We were in a cost-of-living crisis before Trump showed up and started stomping all over us, and that’s what I hear from people everywhere I go. People cannot pay rent or buy groceries and have money left over for their insane cell phone bills, for the high cost of transportation, and for the increasing cost of healthcare as it gets privatized. We need solutions to that, and the NDP is where we have concrete proposals.”
Lewis also added that he believes that Brad Ward, a former Brantford City Councillor and NDP MPP, will receive unanimous support during an upcoming riding association meeting set for this Saturday.
“Brad is a community leader, a local fixture here for decades, and former elected official for the Ontario NDP, and I think we got a shot because we’re at the ground level where people live, and we’re talking about the crisis of everyday life,” he said.
Ward, who served as Councillor for Ward 2 alongside Kevin Davis in the 1980s, described himself as a second-generation NDP supporter, saying the party is the “only party that represents the working people’s interests.”
“We’re not rich, we’re not powerful and we need a party that represents us. In my opinion, the only party that does that is the NDP. The Conservatives and Liberals are with the rich and powerful,” he said. “They’re financed by the rich while the NDP counts on working people to support us. Instead of $500,000, we get $5, $10, $15 or $20 at a time, and to me, that’s more important than having some rich person giving me money in exchange for a bunch of favours. That’s why I’ve always supported the NDP and the working people; the seniors, farmers, small businesses owners and working families. And I think people are starting to recognize after 35 years of Conservative and Liberal rule in our community, our city deserves to begin making progress here even if we have a long way to go.”
Ward said if elected by the association, he is ready to take on the larger parties with a campaign centred on the concerns faced by local residents.
“No one’s given us a chance. We’re the underdogs, the true underdogs. It’s like David against Goliath. The Conservatives and the Liberals? They have all the money. They have all the signs and they’ll have their paid canvassers. But what we have is heart. We have a dedicated group of volunteers who are going to work hard. We’ll keep our nose to the grindstone, knock on doors, get our message out, and I think we’ll surprise some people when the election results come in,” he said. “I’ve got the fire in my belly again and I’m looking forward to talking about the issues that the people of Brantford, Brant County and Six Nations are facing, which is affordability. They worry about how they’re going to pay their bills. They’re worrying about how they’re going to buy groceries, keep a roof over their head, and no matter how hard they work, they’re falling behind while we see the rich and powerful getting richer, and to me, that’s not fair.”
Kimberly De Jong’s reporting is funded by the Canadian government through its Local Journalism Initiative.The funding allows her to report rural and agricultural stories from Blandford-Blenheim and Brant County. Reach her at kimberly.dejong@brantbeacon.ca.
