McQuail finished in fifth place with 945 votes
Huron County farmer Tony McQuail is back at Meeting Place Organic Farm in Lucknow after vying to replace Jagmeet Singh as the leader of the federal NDP.
“It was a very hopeful and positive experience for me,” he told Farms.com. “I was very pleased with what we were able to bring to the campaign with the team.”
McQuail and four other candidates ran in the leadership race which began in September 2025.
The 73-year-old farmer and political veteran ran on themes of representation, regeneration, redistribution, and redesign.
His vision for the NDP included electoral reform to ensure Canadians are proportionately heard in elections.
“Because of the first past the post system, the rural voice has basically been lost in terms of the MPs and MPPs we elect,” he said. “This means people don’t hear enough about rural issues.”
McQuail’s opponents in the race were Rob Ashton, the national president of the International Longshore Workers Union, Tanille Johnston, a city councillor in Campbell River, sitting MP for Edmonton—Strathcona Heather McPherson, and eventual winner Avi Lewis, a former journalist.
The Ontario producer entered the race as the perceived underdog.
He raised just over $123,000 during the campaign, which was the lowest amount of the five candidates. And at the convention he received the fewest votes – 945 – amounting for about 1 per cent of party support.
At times he didn’t know if he’d be able to continue his push for the leadership.
“I didn’t think we’d make the second payment,” he said.
He even suspended campaign fundraising twice and encouraged his supporters to make their contributions towards Johnston’s campaign.
Both times he was able to make the necessary fundraising deadline to stay in the race after Johnston secured the required support to continue her campaign.
This showed his message resonated across Canada.
“We did a livestream that included everything from music and entertainment to discussions about important topics, to a tour of my farm,” he said. “And people tuned in from across the country. It was very humbling to see that people saw value in what we were doing and wanted to contribute to that.”
Continuing in the leadership race meant preparing for debates in both official languages.
Most candidates struggled in the French debate.
But whether in English or French, McQuail wanted to make sure his message was simple and consistent.
“Tommy Douglas used to say, ‘tell them what you’re going to tell them, then tell them what you told them,’” McQuail said. “I didn’t try to overprepare, but I made sure I hit on the points of representation and the other issues we felt were important.”
The campaign culminated at the national convention in March.
Each candidate addressed the party membership prior to the vote.
Once the results were in, newly elected Leader Avi Lewis called McQuail and the other candidates to join him on stage.
“I thought that was very powerful,” McQuail said. “The results signaled the end of the leadership campaign but the start of a broader rebuilding program about how we can bring our teams and our efforts to work with the new leader.”
McQuail acknowledges the NDP has work to do.
The party only has six seats in the House of Commons and Lewis cannot be in the House as he’s not an elected MP.
But the progressive vote is alive and well.
“I don’t think the party is as dead as people think it is because of the numbers in Parliament at the moment,” he said. “The NDP and the Greens offer a different viewpoint than the Conservatives and Liberals, who think you can keep growing economically in terms of energy and resource use on a finite planet.”
Despite the leadership race being over, McQuail isn’t finished supporting the party.
He plans to meet with his team soon for a debrief on the race and what the future might hold.
“I certainly have the energy to keep going,” he said. “I’m interested in doing workshops for ridings about how to build association groups. I’ve got two booked in April already and I’m looking at other ways to build connection and support each other.”