The Ontario NDP’s biennial meeting in Niagara Falls this weekend is not expected to have anything like the fireworks of the Liberal meeting that just passed. NDP leader Marit Stiles faces a leadership review, like Bonnie Crombie did last weekend, but there’s been far less opposition to Stiles’s tenure — and nothing remotely as organized or prominent as Crombie’s critics.
Which isn’t to say the official opposition isn’t dealing with substantial matters. One of the big questions going into this weekend will be if the party softens its current hostility toward nuclear power.
The language of the NDP’s current policy on nuclear isn’t exactly outright prohibition, but it’s close. The 2024 policy book’s statement on nuclear power — drawing on multiple resolutions passed as far back as the 1980s — declares that the NDP: “Opposes further nuclear energy projects until such time as the safe disposal of wastes and the safety of the projects themselves can be assured and then only where a definite need for such projects can be clearly demonstrated,” as well as a litany of other conditions that would functionally make new nuclear power impossible to build.
But a resolution will be debated this weekend that would change the party’s policy book to read: “The ONDP joins the [Canadian Labour Congress] and [Ontario Federation of Labour] in supporting all ultra-low emissions electricity sources including hydro, renewables, made-in-Canada nuclear and storage”.
This weekend’s meeting was initially scheduled for January, and was rescheduled due to the imminent threat of an early election. So, the change in policy has had an extended debate within party ranks.
“There’s been heated discussion — I mean, New Democrats love to get into the weeds of things, love to have passionate arguments about stuff other people don’t give a shit about,” says James Adair, co-president of the University of Ottawa NDP Youth, one of the party members pushing for the change. In recent weeks, Adair says, the tenor of the debate has been collaborative and rooted in common party principles.
Adair, who is also the policy director of the Ontario NDP Youth, says younger members of the left have a different relationship with nuclear power than older progressives.
“You have an older generation whose engagement with the environment came from issues of waste and conservation… for a lot of young people it starts with the climate crisis, reducing greenhouse gas emissions and the use of fossil fuels,” he says. “Obviously I’m still concerned about waste, I don’t want to dismiss those concerns, but I view nuclear as a way to massively reduce our emissions.”
There is, unsurprisingly, a robust debate within the party. Perspectives, a journal published by the Broadbent Institute, recently published a pro-nuclear essay by Adair as well as an anti-nuclear one by David Robertson, which warned of the potential high costs and other risks of Ontario’s nuclear ambitions. The plans already announced by the Ford government — refurbishments of existing reactors as well as new additions to the provincial fleet — will certainly add up to tens of billions of dollars in new investment.
Toronto-Danforth MPP Peter Tabuns is not the party’s energy critic (that’s Sudbury’s Jamie West), but he holds the critic portfolio for the environment, conservation, and parks. Before entering politics he was also the executive director of Greenpeace Canada, an organization formed at the height of the anti-nuclear movement. Nevertheless, he believes he can support the motion.
“I’ve always recognized that energy workers, even workers in oil and gas, were doing important work that let them live their lives. Recognizing the value of energy workers is not a big change for me,” Tabuns says. “The approach we’ve got is one I think works politically and is something NDPers can get behind.”
Sources tell TVO Today that the motion will likely pass but not without a substantial amendment emphasizing the party’s commitment to the free, prior, and informed consent of Indigenous people, a change supported by all sides.
The reality of party conventions is that policies adopted by members don’t necessarily end up being championed by party leadership — and may never appear in a campaign platform. But Tabuns says he expects the change in language to be reflected by the party leadership.
“I think there’s broad agreement that what we’ve hammered out is what people want to see. I think this will be reflected in our policies and platform. I’d be surprised if it wasn’t,” he added.
Adair says he thinks the change in position will help the party more effectively prosecute its arguments against the Ford government over the next several years of this legislature.
“This might be overly optimistic or grandiose, but this is a pretty significant change, and I don’t think a lot of people realize what’s happening,” he says. “They’ll understand when Jamie West stands up in Queen’s Park and says, ‘We support nuclear energy workers, we support nuclear energy, but it should be Canadian owned.’ I think that’s the possibility.”
Donate Now