The Metro New Democratic Party was a political party in

Metropolitan Toronto The Municipality of Metropolitan Toronto was an upper-tier level of municipal government in Ontario, Canada, from 1953 to 1998. It was made up of the old city of Toronto and numerous townships, towns and villages that surrounded Toronto, whic ...

Ontario Ontario is the southernmost Provinces and territories of Canada, province of Canada. Located in Central Canada, Ontario is the Population of Canada by province and territory, country's most populous province. As of the 2021 Canadian census, it ...

, Canada. It supported candidates for election to the municipal councils and school boards of the six municipalities that made up Metro Toronto. The party was organized by supporters of the

social democratic Social democracy is a Social philosophy, social, Economic ideology, economic, and political philosophy within socialism that supports Democracy, political and economic democracy and a gradualist, reformist, and democratic approach toward achi ...

New Democratic Party of Canada The New Democratic Party (NDP; , ) is a federal political party in Canada. Widely described as social democratic,The party is widely described as social democratic: * * * * * * * * * * * * * The Editors of ''Encyclopædia Britann ...

, and its provincial wing, the

Ontario New Democratic Party The Ontario New Democratic Party (NDP; , NPD) is a social democratic political party in Ontario, Canada. The party sits on the centre-left of the political spectrum. It is Ontario’s provincial section of the federal New Democratic Party. The ...

(NDP). Elections in Toronto and its suburbs, as in other municipalities in the Province of Ontario, have traditionally not been the domain of formal political parties. Candidates for election to municipal councils and school boards typically run as individuals, and not as members of political parties. In the 1970s and 1980s, New Democrats in Metro Toronto attempted to introduce party politics by using campaign materials featuring a "Metro NDP" logo, and by forming an official NDP caucus on Toronto city council. Not all New Democratic city councillors chose to use the NDP colours and logos, however. Since there was no mechanism for parties to register or to operate officially on the municipal level, the NDP operation was largely informal. Local ward associations were set up to nominate candidates in a number of wards, particularly downtown wards, but no party name ever appeared on a ballot - and there was no mechanism for the Metro NDP to accept election donations. The attempt to introduce party politics had limited success. Most officials elected came from downtown

Toronto Toronto ( , locally pronounced or ) is the List of the largest municipalities in Canada by population, most populous city in Canada. It is the capital city of the Provinces and territories of Canada, Canadian province of Ontario. With a p ...

: only a handful came from the

suburb A suburb (more broadly suburban area) is an area within a metropolitan area. They are oftentimes where most of a metropolitan areas jobs are located with some being predominantly residential. They can either be denser or less densely populated ...

s. In 1991 the Toronto NDP held a convention and nominated

Jack Layton John Gilbert Layton (July 18, 1950 – August 22, 2011) was a Canadian politician and academic who served as the leader of the New Democratic Party (NDP) from 2003 to 2011 and leader of the Official Opposition in 2011. He previously sat on T ...

as its mayoral candidate - the first and last official NDP nominee for the position although CCFer Jimmy Simpson was

Mayor of Toronto The mayor of Toronto is the head of Toronto City Council and chief executive officer of the Municipal government of Toronto, municipal government. The mayor is elected alongside city council every four years on the fourth Monday of October; t ...

in 1935 and NDP member William Dennison was mayor from 1966 to 1972. Layton was unsuccessful in his mayoral run losing to

June Rowlands June Rowlands (née Pendock; May 14, 1924 – December 21, 2017) was a Canadian politician who was the 60th mayor of Toronto from 1991 to 1994. She was the first woman to serve as Toronto's mayor. Rowlands also served as a city councillor and w ...

. The growing unpopularity of the

Bob Rae Robert Keith Rae (born August 2, 1948) is a Canadian diplomat and former politician who is the current Canadian Ambassador to the United Nations since 2020. He previously served as the 21st premier of Ontario from 1990 to 1995, leader of the ...

government resulted in incumbent NDP councillors and trustees running without a party label in the 1994 municipal election. Thus ended the NDP's formal presence in Toronto municipal politics. A stronger than expected performance by NDP-aligned councillors running as independents provided a strong argument against reviving party affiliations in the 1997 or subsequent elections. While members of the NDP co-operate on city council and on the

Toronto District School Board The Toronto District School Board (TDSB), formerly known as English-language Public District School Board No. 12 prior to 1999, is the English-language public-secular school board for Toronto, Ontario, Canada. The minority public-secular franco ...

, there is no longer an official NDP caucus. At various times, the Liberals have also attempted to run candidates in Toronto municipal elections, most notably in 1969 when Professor Stephen Clarkson was the nominee of the " Civic Liberals" for the mayor's office. Clarkson came third. More recently, the name "Metro NDP" has been revived in order to refer to a regional organization of Ontario NDP provincial

riding association An electoral district association (), commonly known as a riding association () or constituency association, is the basic unit of a political party at the level of the electoral district An electoral (congressional, legislative, etc.) distr ...

s in Toronto rather than to a municipal political party.

References

External links

Metro NDP
network of federal/provincial NDP riding associations in Toronto. {{Ontario New Democratic Party Municipal political parties in Toronto Municipal affiliates of the New Democratic Party Ontario New Democratic Party History of the New Democratic Party (Canada)