Many critics I've heard harp on the provincial-federal NDP divide come from a perspecrive that a party has to speak with one voice on every issue. In a country as large, as geographically, as demographically and as economically diverse as Canada, such whipped up parties imply they do not represent Canada well. The whipping up is also straight up undemocraric. We have MPs who talk amongst each other and vote on issues. That's how those differences are resolved democratically. Presenting this as a negative I think goes against the values of a lot of NDP members. Lewis handles this brilliantly by saying this is a sign of a growing tent and disagreements are inevitable in a democratic system.
Separate, on the energy front, he made a very good pro-worker case for his policy that I think a lot of prairie workers may buy. If that happens, it would make the provincial NDP leaders appear unrepresentative of their constituents.