OTTAWA - Affordability measures dominated the promises on the federal election trail on Saturday, with the NDP focused on capping the price of some food items and Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre offering more tax writeoffs to some trades workers.
The first week of the federal election drew to a close with both Liberal Leader Mark Carney and NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh paying a visit to the national capital.
Singh visited a food bank in the city's Ottawa Centre riding, and Carney stopped by his own campaign office in Nepean for the first time. Carney is seeking a seat in the suburban Ottawa riding and met with campaign volunteers and supporters in his only scheduled stop of the day.
The NDP leader promised to introduce emergency price caps on basic food items like pasta, frozen vegetables and infant formula. He is also calling for higher taxes on grocery chain profits and tighter competition regulations for the sector.
"A lot of Canadians are worried about how much it costs them when they go to the grocery store," Singh said, noting those fears have intensified due to anxiety about the impact of U.S. tariffs under President Donald Trump.
"I want folks to know that we see you and we hear you," Singh said Saturday.
Singh said corporate grocery stores are "ripping you off and driving up the cost of food."
He said the emergency price cap would follow similar moves in France and Greece, and a party spokesperson said the measures proposed Saturday would only cost Ottawa some public-service hours and would not require federal subsidies.
Poilievre, the first national party leader to campaign in any of the prairie provinces so far, was in Winnipeg for an afternoon rally hours after unveiling a promise to help trade workers who must travel more than 120 kilometres from their homes to their jobs.
He said a Conservative government would expand the writeoff that trade workers can declare for work travel.
Trades workers can currently claim up to $4,000 in travel expenses for work tasks, which Poilievre said he would expand to include "the full cost of food, transportation and accommodation."
The Tories also say they want to end tax writeoffs involving luxury corporate jets, arguing those businesses can instead write off the equivalent cost of commercial flights as well as any required charter flights.
"Conservatives want to unleash the strength of our mighty workers, unleash our economy, and put our country first for a change, by delivering tax fairness for everyone," Poilievre said.
The Conservatives did not respond to a question about how much these measures would cost the federal government.
The announcement is unlikely to diminish criticism from within Poilievre's own conservative circles that he and his campaign manager, Jenni Byrne, are failing to read the mood of Canadians and refocus the campaign on the impact of Trump's tariffs and Canadian sovereignty.
Kory Teneycke, who was a communications director under former prime minister Stephen Harper and recently ran Ontario Premier Doug Ford's third successful election campaign, threw down the gloves over Poilievre and the federal party's performance in an event at the Empire Club of Canada on March 26.
"In the campaign cockpit, every buzzer and alarm is going off," Teneycke said. He also accused Poilievre of focusing on things that have little relevance to voters now.
Before Trump took office, the Poilievre Conservatives had soared in the polls, and appeared to be heading toward forming a majority government on messages about the Liberals making life more expensive and harder overall.
But since Trump was sworn in and began his relentless campaign of tariffs, economic uncertainty and threats of annexation, Canadians priorities and anxieties have shifted.
Most polls now have the Liberals leading the Conservatives, a drastic turn around for a party that at the end of December trailed the Tories by more than 25 points.
Asked Saturday if his campaign was going to pivot at all to focus more directly on the impact of tariffs, Poilievre said he would retaliate against U.S. duties but turned the focus immediately back on the Liberals in Canada for what he called anti-energy laws that have driven investment elsewhere.
"We don't know exactly what the Americans are going to do," he said. "The president seems to change his mind from time to time. But we know what we can do. What we can do is take back control of our economic destiny, build an economic fortress by bringing home production, unlocking our resources, and standing strong for our economy here at home."
Poilievre largely stuck to his own messaging later Saturday at a rally in Winnipeg, where he talked about taxes, inflation and crime, while criticizing Carneys time out of country and his business holdings.
Carney spent a large chunk of the first week directly addressing Canadians concerns about Trump, adjusting his campaign plan and donning his prime minister's hat to return to Ottawa to meet with his U.S.-Canada cabinet committee following Trump's new auto tariff announcement on Wednesday.
The Liberal leader also spoke with Trump by phone Friday for the first time. He also made announcements in the last week to aid the auto industry and its workers with a $2 billion fund, and to encourage the construction of nation-building projects like new highways and railways with a $5 billion infrastructure program.
Carney stopped by his candidate office in Nepean on Saturday, where he was greeted by a small but enthusiastic group of campaign workers and volunteers.
"Who is ready to stand up," he started out saying, before teasing someone who had accidentally knocked over a campaign sign.Â
"Who is ready to put back the Carney signs," he joked, drawing laughter.
He thanked them for their support to help get him elected as an MP for the first time.
Carney has faced questions about his decision to run in that seat, which became vacant only after the Liberal party ousted MP Chandra Arya as its candidate three days before the election was called.
The Liberal party has not clearly laid out exactly what Arya did that has prevented him from being a candidate, though Carney says it was a decision that was up to the green-light committee that screens candidates.
Last August, several Liberals criticized Arya for making an unsanctioned trip to India to meet with Prime Minister Narendra Modi, even as Canada said it had evidence that agents of Modi's government were involved in the murder of a Canadian citizen in British Columbia in 2023.Â
The Liberal party also barred Arya from running for the party leadership in January, citing various rules violations.
— With files from Steve Lambert in Winnipeg, David Baxter, Kyle Duggan and Catherine Morrison
This report by The Canadian Press was first published March 29, 2025.Â
