NDP Leader Avi Lewis issued the following statement following a phone call with Prime Minister Mark Carney:

“This morning, I had a call with the Prime Minister regarding measures the government is taking in response to the Trump administration’s tariffs.

I reiterated the NDP’s support for Canada walking away from a bad deal and welcomed the relief measures announced today as a first step to assist workers and industries.

However, more action is required to make sure workers get the support they need and that we’re responding at scale and speed to the US economic attacks.

To this end, New Democrats are calling for:

• Substantial supports to help workers in tariff-affected sectors. This should include wage subsidies with strong guardrails to prevent their misuse by employers. We cannot afford a repeat of what happened during the pandemic, when corporations received wage subsidies only to award bonuses and dividends to their CEOs and shareholders. The money must be used for keeping workers employed.
• Strengthen EI by ensuring that more workers are able to access EI by reducing the number of hours needed to qualify, and increasing benefits. Our EI system was broken before this trade war started, with only one in three workers qualifying for a program that they pay into. This makes fixing it all the more urgent.
• An export tax on critical minerals and energythat the US depends on. We need to use every bit of our leverage in response to these unjustified tariffs, and the revenue from an export tax can be used to fund enhanced supports for impacted workers and their families.

In the long term, I shared with the PM that I believe we are at a fork in the road in this country, and it’s past time that we doubled down on a clear plan to Trump-proof our economy. So far, the Liberal government’s approach has prioritized sectors that are already disproportionately US-owned, like fossil fuels, AI, and weapons.

New Democrats are excited to start building a safer and more stable future with major projects that are Canadian through and through. Projects that make people’s lives better immediately and in the long term. We’re talking housing, healthcare, manufacturing and transportation running off a 21st century grid, powered by renewable energy. That’s how we can make our country stronger, safer and more affordable for the 99%.”