New Democrats gave tribute to NDP former leader Jagmeet Singh on Friday — just days before they’re set to announce his successor.

Speaking to the convention crowd, former NDP MP Laurel Collins said Singh “changed our party immensely.”

“Time and time again, Jagmeet met every challenge, not with cynicism, but with courage. Not with fear, but with unshakable optimism — and under his leadership, that belief turned challenges into real change,” Collins said.

Collins applauded Singh for being the first racialized Canadian to lead a major federal party and for pushing the Liberal government to enact NDP priorities.

In 2022, Singh made an agreement with Justin Trudeau to back the former prime minister’s minority Liberal government on confidence votes in exchange for movement on a number of key policies, including dental care, “anti-scab” legislation and housing funding.

Most New Democrats who spoke to CBC News at the convention on Friday pointed to those policy achievements as a large part of Singh’s legacy, for better or worse.

“I think his legacy is complicated, to be diplomatic. I think he made a lot of choices that were reasonable at the time and could have been more successful if they were communicated better,” Andrew Ankersen, from Hamilton, said.

Ankersen argued that the agreement backfired on Singh once Trudeau resigned — and a recent survey from Abacus Data suggests he has a point.

A little over a quarter of the roughly 1,500 surveyed said the agreement gave them a more positive view of the NDP. But 37 per cent said the opposite, viewing the party as propping up an increasingly unpopular Trudeau government.

“Once Trudeau stepped down, [Singh] was cooked. He was the guy holding the ball for whatever you were mad at for the last 10 years,” Ankersen said.

Singh had difficulty translating his policy wins into electoral success — leading the party to a historic low, only returning seven MPs to Parliament last year.

But Toronto’s Charlie Fairbank, who joined the party to support Singh’s 2017 leadership campaign, said the former leader deserves credit for squeezing some policies out of Trudeau.

“I think, still, the dust is settling with a lot of these things. But I do think he played an important role,” he said.

Kristine Wickner, president of the New Brunswick NDP, agreed. She said the NDP didn’t get credit for “pushing the Liberals further to the left.”

Fairbank said Singh becoming the first racialized leader of a major federal party is a key part of his legacy — something that was also heavily featured in a tribute video played at the convention.

The video offered more details on how Singh had dealt with death threats, something he has openly discussed. During the video, a friend of Singh revealed that the threats were so serious that he and his wife needed an armed police escort to the hospital for the birth of their second child.

Singh didn’t deliver any remarks at Friday’s event but the crowd gave him a standing ovation following the video.

Questions about the future

Whoever the party chooses to replace Singh will have to focus on rebuilding.

The NDP’s fortunes haven’t changed much since last April, according to Philippe Fournier, a polls analyst with 338Canada.com.

“When we look at the polls, we see single digits, low double digits sometimes and a very soft vote,” he said.

On top of their polling woes, the party is also still $13 million in debt following the last election.

Five candidates — Alberta MP Heather McPherson, activist and filmmaker Avi Lewis, union leader Rob Ashton, farmer Tony McQuail and social worker and municipal councillor Tanille Johnston — have put their name forward for the party’s top job.

But Ankersen said the party needs to focus on standing firm in its values, organizing and rallying its base at the riding level.

“To be very blunt, I think we need to move away a little bit from being so leader centric,” he said. “I kind of think that picking a new leader is the least important thing that’s going happen here.”

Wickner said she’s confident the party can push itself into a strong position in this political context.

“We’ve been here before and we know how to get back to where we can earn the trust of Canadians again,” she said.

Fairbank said the party needs to focus on communicating with Canadians and being “unapologetically progressive.”

“Most of the time New Democrat values would be similar to a lot of Canadians,” he said.

Fournier says it’s too early to tell how a new leader will impact the party’s fortunes in the polls.

“We don’t expect the numbers to change on Monday or even next week or even next month,” he said.

“But if the next leader plays the long game and tries to reconnect with the grassroots, we could see improvements.”