NDP targets health care privatization as party hopes for inroads in Alberta

NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh discusses his defending of universal health care, and his plan to protect Canada's public health system.

Jagmeet Singh and the NDP are taking aim at what they call the “Americanization” of public health care as the party looks to make inroads in Alberta by calling out Premier Danielle Smith.

Unveiling a new campaign pledge in a province he called “ground zero” for privatization under Smith, the NDP leader said Tuesday in Edmonton that Canada’s health-care system would not be for sale with the New Democrats in power.

“From the beginning, Tommy Douglas said when we fought to bring in health care that there would be vultures circling, trying to find ways to profit off the pain of Canadians,” Singh said. “We reject that notion that you should make money off the pain of Canadians.”

Singh is promising to crack down on so-called cash-for-care clinics that charge Canadians for basic services, and ban American firms from buying up Canadian health-care assets.

• Full coverage of the 2025 election campaign

Singh accused the Conservatives of backing expansion of for-profit care and said the Liberals have been happy to let provinces such as Alberta and Ontario flirt with private care models.

He said provinces that want federal funding would have to fully enforce public health-care standards under an NDP government.

Singh’s criticism of Smith was a departure from the tone set by his Monday campaign stop in B.C., where he met with Premier David Eby. He also plans to visit with Manitoba Premier Wab Kinew, a fellow New Democrat, when his campaign comes to Winnipeg on Wednesday.

In Alberta, Singh and the NDP hope to make inroads in hotly contested ridings such as Edmonton-Centre, which Liberal Randy Boisonnault won by just under 600 votes over his Conservative rival in 2021.

The NDP came in a close third in the riding and candidate Trisha Estabrooks said at a campaign event Monday night that she believes the party has an opportunity to win since the Liberal incumbent isn’t running again.

“In this riding, we historically elect New Democrat MLAs by huge margins, and so we know there is tremendous potential and a desire on behalf of Edmontonians to send a true progressive voice to Ottawa this time,” she said.

Singh said Tuesday that the party shouldn’t be counted out, despite its low poll numbers, noting the provincial NDP in Ontario formed official opposition, instead of collapsing “entirely” as some had predicted.

The NDP won two seats in Edmonton in 2021 — Blake Desjarlais unseated Conservative incumbent Kerry Diotte in Edmonton-Griesbach, and Heather McPherson held Edmonton-Strathcona with 60 per cent of the vote. McPherson’s is a seat the NDP have won since 2008.

Desjarlais is up against Diotte again. He said Tuesday that the 2021 election happened during the COVID-19 pandemic and the riding saw a turnout of about 52 per cent.

“The weakness of the Conservatives here in Alberta is they take Albertans for granted,” he said, adding that he’s concerned about low turnout in this election as well.

“When we think about votes in an election, you can’t just count those who have voted,” he said. “Those are the votes that I really think about every day.”

McPherson said Monday that the party prevailed in the riding “one doorstep at a time.”

She said that’s how the NDP doubled its seat count in the province in 2021, “and we expect to at least double it in 2025.”

McPherson’s predecessor in the riding, Linda Duncan, was first elected in 2008. Duncan said she “finally broke through” in the city after campaigning for two years and hopes the party can make headway in Ottawa as it has provincially.

“This entire city provincially is NDP. The anomaly is that the whole city isn’t orange federally, and we’re changing that,” she said.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published April 1, 2025.

Craig Lord and Daryl Greer, The Canadian Press