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Alberta Politics

brian topp comes to edmonton.

Brian Topp NDP leadership candidate
NDP leadership candidate Brian Topp

Brian Topp was in Edmonton last night campaigning for the leadership of the New Democratic Party of Canada. At an event hosted by the Edmonton-Strathcona NDP association, more than 130 people packed into the City Arts Centre to listen to Mr. Topp deliver a pitch for their votes in the leadership contest.

A long-time political operative in the federal NDP and Saskatchewan NDP, Mr. Topp has never actually served in elected office. Facing a friendly crowd, he was well-spoken and displayed a healthy level of pragmatism when answering questions about delivering an effective opposition and building the NDP towards forming government. Hitting on issues friendly to the social democrat crowd, Mr. Topp spoke about raising corporate taxes, returning to a progressive tax system, abolishing the Senate, and implementing stricter environmental regulations.

I have not paid much attention to or written much about to the NDP leadership contest until this point, so I have turned to Pundits’ Guide’s excellent resource on the contest to get myself informed.

The local NDP association will be holding a leadership candidate event with Parkdale-High Park Member of Parliament Peggy Nash on Friday, December 16, 2011.

In the 2011 federal election, the NDP received 107,067 votes in Edmonton (25% of the vote). The poll results in the map below show the NDP vote is concentrated in Edmonton-Centre, Edmonton-East, and Edmonton-Strathcona.

Edmonton Election 2011 Federal Poll by Poll
Poll results in Edmonton from the May 2011 federal election.
Categories
Alberta Politics

ndp leadership candidates attending edmonton kitchen table talks.

2012 NDP leadership candidates Nathan Cullen Paul Dewar and Brian Topp
Three federal NDP leadership candidates: Nathan Cullen, Paul Dewar, and Brian Topp

Home of Alberta’s only NDP Member of Parliament, Linda Duncan, the Edmonton-Strathcona NDP Association is hosting a series of “Kitchen Table Talks” with NDP leadership candidates (named in honour of Jack Layton and his penchant for addressing the kinds of problems that people talk about around the kitchen table).

The informal format of the “kitchen table talks” will give Edmontonians a chance to meet the candidates and give the candidates a chance to ask questions and engage with participants.

Talks have been scheduled with three of the leadership candidates, so far:

November 17: Nathan Cullen 18:30-20:30 at the McKernan Community League, 11341 78th Avenue

November 22: Paul Dewar 19:30-21:30 at the City Arts Centre, 10943 84th Avenue

December 12: Brian Topp 19:30-21:30 at the City Arts Centre, 10943 84th Avenue

The other candidates to enter the leadership contest are Niki Ashton, Robert ChisholmThomas Mulcair, Peggy Nash, Romeo Saganash, and Martin Singh. NDP members will be selecting their new leader on March 24, 2012.

Visit PunditGuide.ca for more detailed information about the NDP leadership contest.