Naheed Nenshi finding his feet leading an Alberta NDP still under construction

Naheed Nenshi delivers his acceptance speech after being named the new leader of the Alberta NDP in Calgary on June 22, 2024. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Jeff McIntosh

Naheed Nenshi is still looking to find his feet — and a seat in the legislature — after six months on the job as leader of Alberta's NDP.

“I really am still getting my skis under me,” the former Calgary mayor said of his new gig in a recent year-end interview.

Without a seat in the house, he's been watching the cut and thrust of the provincial legislature from the sidelines, and he's trying new things.

The Opposition NDP has become more targeted in its media messaging and its approach to debates in the house, in part to avoid the trap of responding to the United Conservative Party government with daily outrage, he said.

"It's almost been useful for me to have the freedom to go talk to the nurses or the teachers or the parents or the cops, rather than be sitting in that room watching really, really bad acting and really terrible drama on the other side of the aisle," he said.

Still, the question of where and when Nenshi might get a seat in that hostile theatre is likely to continue to dog him in 2025.

This year was bookended by Rachel Notley announcing in January her resignation as party leader and recently that she would leave the legislature Dec. 30.

In June, Nenshi took the helm.

With Notley's Edmonton-Strathcona seat soon to be vacant, Nenshi could look to get elected in the capital, where he now spends much of his time.

He said he isn't expecting Premier Danielle Smith to call a byelection before the six-month deadline to do so in June, after the house traditionally breaks for the summer.

"The premier will delay the byelection to keep me out so that I can't be part of the budget debates," he said.

In more ways than one, the NDP is still under construction.

Hanging over Nenshi's head is a steady stream of UCP attack ads accusing the provincial New Democrats of being under the thumb of Jagmeet Singh's federal NDP.

Provincial members automatically become part of the federal party, despite clear policy differences between the two, especially when it comes to the oil and gas industry.

Nenshi has long said he wants to bring the federal membership issue to his party members to decide as soon as possible.

The earliest NDP members could debate, and potentially change that sticking point in the party's constitution, is in early May at the next NDP policy convention in Edmonton.

There, members are also expected to steer the direction of what has largely remained a blank slate of a plan and platform.

In the new year, Nenshi said the focus will continue to be on what he says has been missing from the UCP's legislative agenda: affordability, jobs, health care, public safety and education.

"These are not priorities for this government at all."

He has moved on one front by putting his former health critic, Luanne Metz, in charge of consulting on and fleshing out a health-care plan next year.

“(The UCP is) making this up as they go along and we’re going to take the time to get it right," Nenshi said.

The NDP offered a few priorities in the fall.

New Democrats pitched private member's bills that aim to protect workers' tips from being pocketed by employers, bring in cancer care delivery standards and take action on Indigenous reconciliation.

A proposal to bring back school class size reporting was defeated.

There are UCP policies Nenshi hopes to one day repeal, including what he calls the "cruel, hateful" legislation that restricts transgender health care and will bring in pronoun policy in schools.

And, after the first full year of the government's loosened ethics rules for political staff to accept gifts, Nenshi has another proposal.

"Throw open the curtains so that we can see all of the grift and corruption that has happened under this government to make sure it's not repeated ever," he said.

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This report by The Canadian Press was first published on Dec. 26, 2024.