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Oct. 17 - Oct. 22, 2004 |
Jack Layton ready to take on Liberals
Federal NDP Leader discusses things from Trudeau to advancing the urban agenda
By Ken Shular
Originally Published: 2004-01-18
With all of the news swirling around the formation of the new Conservative party, or what has been happening with the Liberals at the federal level, it's sometimes hard to remember there is a third national party, which its leader describes as being the 'party of the people.'
Jack Layton, the federal leader of the New Democratic Party of Canada, was in town recently hosting a leadership levy in his home riding of Toronto-Danforth. It was at this time, that Layton took the opportunity to sit down with the Tandem and discuss his party's outlook.
At the moment, the NDP is enjoying a surge in support in which a recent poll had them trailing the front-running Liberals, at 8.5 percent, (the Liberals were enjoying about 51 percent support). And while the numbers for the NDP aren't as high as in 1988, when they stood at 20.5 percent with former leader Ed Broadbent at the helm, they do show that interest in the New Democrats is on the rise. Most importantly, said Layton, is the increased support of the party among younger people.
"I think that was one of the reasons I was chosen leader. We had a lot of young people that wanted us to change direction. They wanted us to be more focussed on urban issues," he said. "When Stephen Paige of the Barenaked Ladies had that concert for us, his message was to young people, and we had thousands and thousands of young people join our political party in the last year. I mean it's fantastic. We just about doubled our party membership from 52,000 Canadians to 100,000... and we're still growing. And of course a lot of it has been through the Internet."
At the provincial level, in Ontario at least, the underlying theme behind the New Democrats having seen their share of seats held in Queen's Park, drop, the thought of many observers was that the party had lost touch with younger generations. Some even suggested that the party needs to undergo a makeover and a change in its philosophy.
Layton, who was elected last year to be the leader of the federal party, was chosen just for that very reason, to connect with youth.
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