Tasha Kheiriddin: Canada's leftists are out for revenge - National Post

Protesters gather at Nathan Phillips Square before marching to the Art Gallery of Ontario to protest Mark Carney's global investment summit. Toronto, Ont, September 14, 2026. Nick Kozak for Postmedia News. Photo by Nick KozakArticle contentFor a movement supposedly wandering the political wilderness, the Canadian left made a lot of noise in downtown Toronto Monday night.  

Hundreds of protesters gathered at Nathan Phillips Square before marching to the Art Gallery of Ontario, where Prime Minister Mark Carney was hosting some of the world’s wealthiest investors. The demonstration reunited an old-school coalition of labour unions, Indigenous activists, environmentalists, housing advocates and anti-war groups under a new(ish) slogan: “The Many vs. The Money.” Memories of Occupy Wall Street and “We are the 99 per cent” wafted through the air, though thankfully no one sought to pitch tents outside city hall — yet. 

Welcome back, class warfare. Only 18 months ago, the Canadian left looked decidedly passé. The 2025 federal election devastated the NDP, reducing it to six seats and costing leader Jagmeet Singh his own. Voters worried about U.S. President Donald Trump and economic instability flocked to Carney and his promise of sober, competent government. 

Columnist Jesse Kline keeps you up to date with what’s happening in Israel and the effects of antisemitism on life here in Canada. Friday mornings.

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Then this past March, Avi Lewis won the NDP leadership with 56 per cent of the first-ballot vote. Lewis’ platform took a sharp left turn, pledging wealth taxes, public grocery stores, and fossil fuel moratoria. Underlining it all was a slogan that sounded all too familiar this weekend: “for the many, not the money.” 

Now, Carney may have given the NDP a boost — or at least, a foil. His Canada Investment Summit brought leading global investors and Canadian CEOs to Toronto to pitch more than 160 projects in energy, mining, technology and infrastructure. He’s also talking about privatizing airports and announced the Productivity Mega Deduction, a set of tax incentives that will cut Canada’s marginal effective tax rate on new business investment from 13 per cent to 6.4 per cent, less than half the U.S. rate and the lowest among major economies. 

That’s music to Lewis’ ears. It bolsters his accusations that Carney, the former banker and Brookfield chair, is putting corporations ahead of Canadians struggling with affordability — and boosts Lewis’ call to “redeploy” the country’s wealth “to directly address the daily emergency that Canadians are going through.”