Liberals pitch public safety measures and economic management to Toronto-area voters

Liberal Leader Mark Carney holds a rally in Saskatoon, Sask., on Wednesday, April 9, 2025. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Sean Kilpatrick

Liberal Leader Mark Carney is pitching safer communities and an economic future for the battleground Greater Toronto Area, where he says locals are fearful of tariffs and of real-life attacks driven by online cesspools.

“Ultimately, safe communities come from within, from who we are and how we treat each other,” Carney told reporters in Brampton, Ont.

“It’s not the Canadian way to stoke fear, anger and division. It’s not the Canadian way to point fingers at each other. The Canadian way — our way — is to come together, to solve problems and look out for each other. That’s how we build communities that are safe, secure and strong.”

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The Toronto area is rich in swing ridings that parties rely on to form government.

Carney pitched measures Thursday to crack down on the vehicle thefts and gun crime that have many voters in the region rattled. Carney also promised “deeply affordable homes” in a region that has been short of housing for years.

He pledged to revisit the federal government’s firearms buyback program to make it more effective. The policy compensates gun owners who are being forced to give up assault-style weapons the government has banned.

He also promised legislation that would make it a criminal offence to “intentionally and wilfully obstruct” access to places of worship, schools and community centres. The legislation also would make it a criminal offence to intimidate or threaten people in those locations.

Carney said a government led by him would revoke gun licences from people convicted of violent offences and toughen oversight on firearms licensing.

He made the pledge at the local Sheridan College campus, after touring a forensic training program.

Carney also pledged to recruit 1,000 more RCMP personnel to combat drug and human trafficking and organized criminal groups.

Nathalie Provost, a survivor of the 1989 Montreal Polytechnique massacre and a longtime gun control advocate, is running as a Liberal candidate. She said after being a frequent critic of the Liberals, she’s confident they can deliver on gun control.

“If the action is not quick enough, I will be there from inside,” she told reporters Thursday after Carney’s news conference. “But (be) sure that people in Quebec will make sure it’s done.”

The group PolyRemembers, which Provost served as a spokeswoman, praised Carney’s pledge but noted the Liberals made the same commitment in May 2020 and promised similar moves in the 2019 and 2021 elections.

“We have high expectations that this will finally be accomplished under a re-elected Liberal government, given the enormous delays the former government oversaw,” the group wrote in a statement.

The Conservatives dismissed Carney’s announcements Thursday as a distraction from grim crime statistics.

“Mark Carney and his Liberal hug-a-thug team are not going to stop the crime after the lost Liberal decade of unleashing a wave of crime and chaos with their catch-and-release policies,” Tory candidate Larry Brock wrote in a statement.

Carney spoke in Brampton, a city of almost 800,000 people just north of Toronto, which has a large South Asian population. Local media there asked him how he would heal a deep diplomatic rift with India.

The rift stems from allegations that New Delhi had a hand in the 2023 assassination of a Sikh leader near Vancouver and other crimes, and has not been complying with RCMP investigations.

“We would welcome a strengthening of ties with India, but any relationship is two-sided,” Carney said, adding that there must be mutual “transparency” and respect.

Carney then visited Hamilton for an afternoon rally with supporters and volunteers

At the Hamilton rally, Carney was interrupted by a heckler who brought up a conspiracy theory, which the Liberal leader said was an example of the toll of online disinformation.

“That’s a mild version of that,” he said of the heckler. “That’s fine; I can take the conspiracy theory and all that. But the more serious things is when it affects how people behave in our society, when Canadians are threatened.”

He said the morning’s announcement on places of worship seeks to sandbag Canada from “the sea of misogyny, antisemitism, hatred, conspiracy theories -- the sort of pollution that’s online that washes over our virtual borders from the United States.”

Rally attendee Andrea Declercq said she worked most of her career in the region’s large automotive manufacturing sector, and she says it’s “scary” how Trump’s tariffs are already putting jobs at risk.

“What we’re experiencing right now can change the entire projection of what our economy looks like,” she said.

Her Niagara riding has been a Conservative stronghold for two decades, and she said locals are looking for someone with a credible plan to deal with tariffs and a housing crunch driven by people fleeing sky-high Toronto prices.

Declerq said she switched from being a Green voter to volunteering for the local Liberal candidate, because Carney has strong climate policies.

“I really wanted to get involved in making a difference,” she said, tearing up. “It feels like, with so much turmoil and toxicity in American politics, that this campaign feels very positive.”

Hamilton local Natasha Charles said locals are feeling the hit from U.S. steel tariffs, and trust Carney to protect the economy.

“It is just ridiculous, these tariffs, because the U.S. is just going to hurt themselves in the long run,” she said.

Charles’ husband has had generations work at Dofasco, Canada’s largest steel mill which has been operating since 1912. She cited the company’s slogan to summarize how the country feels.

“Our product is steel; our strength is people,” she said, echoing the company’s motto.

Carney is returning to Ottawa on Thursday evening, and is pausing his campaign Friday to meet in the morning with his ministers to discuss U.S. President Donald Trump’s tariffs on Canadian imports in Ottawa.

— With files from Alessia Passafiume in Ottawa

This report by The Canadian Press was first published April 10, 2025.