NDP deserved to lose its party status, period
By Lethbridge Herald on May 30, 2025.
Michael Taube
Troy Media
Rules are rules.
That, in a nutshell, is why the NDP wasn’t granted official party status in the House of Commons on Monday. Prime Minister Mark Carney and the Liberals, to their credit, made the right decision.
Let’s examine why.
The 1963 Senate and House of Commons Act passed an amendment that gave an annual allowance to party leaders other than the prime minister and leader of the Opposition. In doing so, the Canadian government had to establish what constitutes a “political party.” The definition they came up with was a sensible one: it had to have a “recognized membership of 12 or more persons in the House of Commons.”
This important amendment is still used today.
The NDP fell from 24 to a paltry seven seats in last month’s federal election. (There are a total of 343 seats in the House of Commons.) They finished with 1,234,673 votes, or 6.29 per cent, which was behind the Liberals, Conservatives and Bloc Québécois. Party leader Jagmeet Singh, who had represented the former Burnaby South riding since 2019, finished a distant third in the newly created Burnaby Central riding and resigned.
The NDP’s seven seats is well below the 12-seat requirement needed for official party status. This means Canada’s socialist alternative won’t be able to ask questions in the House of Commons and will lose out on money for research purposes.
Or, to put it another way, they’re plumb out of luck.
Hold on, some people said. They pointed out that the NDP’s seat count and popular vote only plummeted because many progressive voters backed Carney and the Liberals as the best option to counter U.S. President Donald Trump and his tariffs.
They felt that the NDP’s long history as a champion for unions and the working class should count for something. They suggested there should be an exception to the rule.
Guess what? They’re wrong.
This is the worst election result in the party’s history. Even its predecessor, the Co-operative Commonwealth Federation (CCF), did marginally better in its first campaign. The CCF won seven out of 245 seats—and earned 410,125 votes, or 9.31 per cent—in the 1935 election. Party leader J.S. Woodsworth, who had represented the riding of Winnipeg North Centre as an Independent Labour MP since 1925, comfortably held his seat.
Meanwhile, this won’t be the first time they’ve ever lost official party status.
The NDP dropped from 43 to nine seats in the 1993 election. It was a dismal showing, to say the least. There was a suggestion at the time that then-party leader Audrey McLaughlin, the first woman to lead a party with political representation in Canada’s House of Commons, deserved a better fate.
While the NDP certainly came closer to achieving the 12-seat requirement in this particular election, Prime Minister Jean Chrétien and the Liberals decided against granting them official party status.
Why? As I mentioned earlier, rules are rules.
Then again, British pilot Harry Day notably told his fellow flying ace Douglas Bader in 1931, “You know my views about some regulations—they’re written for the obedience of fools and the guidance of wise men.”
Does this mean that individuals and organizations who follow rules are, in fact, fools? Not at all. While certain rules in a liberal democratic society can range from slightly questionable to utterly ridiculous, they’re usually put in place for a specific purpose.
In the case of the House of Commons, it’s to ensure that a bar has been set with respect to political representation. Is 12 seats the right number? That’s difficult to say. It certainly prevents small protest parties and one-issue parties that unexpectedly win a tiny number of seats in an election from acquiring power and status right off the bat. They need to win more seats and grow in size and stature to reach a point of respectability. Most of them never reach this point and disappear while others float in a constant state of mediocrity like the Green Party of Canada. ’Tis the nature of the political beast.
One final point. If Singh and the NDP had reached double digits in total number of seats in 2025, a solid case could have been made in favour of official party status.
If they had finished with 11 seats, it would have almost been a lock. Neither scenario ultimately materialized, which is why Carney and the Liberals did exactly what they did.
Michael Taube is a political commentator, Troy Media syndicated columnist and former speechwriter for Prime Minister Stephen Harper. He holds a master’s degree in comparative politics from the London School of Economics, lending academic rigour to his political insights.
© Troy Media
25-24
‘Canada’s socialist alternative’? I guess Mr. Taube has decided not to add too much ‘academic rigour’ to his ‘political insights’.
stop with your support of socialist communism sharing caring fair and equitable free society crap. grab what ya can, and use the public trough only for the policing needed to keep what we each grab safe from the commie criminals.
You’re so right, biff. I must have rolled off the woke side of the bed this morning. Grab what you can and, then, try to protect it – as civil society crumbles from a massively unequal economy and destabilized climate … got it!
🙂
yeah, we can fall in behind archaic legislation, and feel justice and, in this case, democracy are served. the greater issue, and truth, is that our electoral system is one of the pressing issues that undermines our democracy. the ndp would have plenty of “party status” as it would have plenty enough representation coming from plenty enough public support, each election – if we had an electoral system that actually honoured democracy and the principle of one person one vote. for that to happen we will need to ditch first past the post, that returns majority govts with as little as 38% popular vote (hardly democratic), and move to a system representative of the actual popular support. this is not nearly the only issue that undermines our democracy, but it is one that needs change now and one that is hardly too difficult to change.
for the writer: you note that it is wrong to suggest the ndp lost support to repel poilievre; however, you do not justify that statement. moreover, the 6% of the popular vote the ndp garnered would give them closer 20 seats were we honouring one person one vote with a rep by pop system.
finally, to the whiners that complain the herald publishes only socialist stuff – this article, as poorly presented as it is, is one for you.