Singh takes first step on NDP’s long road to recovery

While the federal NDP was thrown a lifeline with leader Jagmeet Singh’s byelection victory in Burnaby South on Tuesday, the party suffered an expected, but major, blow at the other end of the country.

The riding where the Orange Wave began turned red on Tuesday night.

Outremont, which Tom Mulcair first won in a 2007 byelection, was claimed by Liberal Rachel Bendayan.

The NDP, then under Jack Layton, turned Mulcair’s beachhead victory into 59 Quebec seats in the 2011 federal election.

With Mulcair at the helm, that total was reduced to 15 seats in the 2015 election and the party has been on a downward trajectory since.

Singh’s victory in Burnaby South on Tuesday was a necessary first step in turning the party’s fortunes around.

Several NDP MPs have announced they won’t be running again this fall, including four from Quebec. And many NDP MPs seeking re-election, especially the Quebec ones, will have an uphill battle on their hands on Oct. 21.

The party needs Singh to perform some magic to stop the freefall.

Trudeaumania was a big reason the Orange Wave turned into an Orange Trickle in 2015.

Voters with progressive leanings jumped ship from the NDP to the Liberals. Meanwhile, moderately conservative voters fed up with Stephen Harper also moved to the Grits.

While much of the sheen has worn off the Trudeau government, the two opposition parties haven’t done enough to lure voters back.

Getting Singh a seat in the House of Commons where Canadians can see him daily sparring with Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Opposition Leader Andrew Scheer was vital for the NDP. Next step: He needs to be effective in the Commons.

While he has been a minor presence in much of the country, Singh has been nearly invisible in Quebec. Saving some of those Quebec seats will have to be one of his top goals.

According to many polls, the Conservatives are neck and neck with the Liberals, but Scheer has yet to prove to Canadians he’s got prime ministerial mettle.

Sure, he’s good at criticizing, but Canadians know little about what the Conservatives might do under his leadership.

If you’re a fan of Donald Trump’s style of politics in the United States, however, Scheer might be your man. He seems to embrace letting Trumpisms creep into his party.

Anti-immigration views, hostility to the media and international organizations, and climate-change denial — they’re not Conservative policies necessarily, but they’re not being discouraged.

Singh’s NDP, on the other hand, has been busy this week actually proposing legislation, rather than just criticizing.

Here’s some of their press release headlines this week:

— NDP health critic to unveil bill to address violence against health care workers

— NDP calling on Liberal government to stop discriminating against women and reform employment insurance

— NDP and Machinists provide update on aerospace strategy

— NDP MP introduces bill to enforce responsible investing of CPP funds

The Conservatives and NDP might think all they need to do is let the Liberals self-destruct with selfinflicted messes like the Jody Wilson-Raybould affair and their inability to build a pipeline.

But they’ll have to do more than just criticize if they want to win back the voters they lost in 2015.

Singh now has his chance and Scheer must step up his game.