As “honored” as she is by her appointment, the new “superminister” of Economy and Energy, Christine Fréchette, did not take long to understand that between Premier François Legault and Hydro-Québec CEO Michael Sabia, she is very likely to be caught between a rock and a hard place.
The departure of Pierre Fitzgibbon seems to have freed up Mr Sabia’s speech, who, on the first day of the study of the energy bill in parliamentary committee, clearly dissociated himself from the policy adopted by the government in the allocation of available electricity to companies.
According to him, the decarbonization of companies already established in Quebec must take priority over the granting of electricity to new companies, to which the government has given precedence. “I think we need to rebalance things,” he said. The message to the new minister could not be clearer.
It was well known that relations between Mr. Sabia and Mr. Fitzgibbon, two men with strong ideas, were not the best. The CEO of Hydro-Québec clearly intends to take advantage of the latter’s departure to redefine his relations with the government. “We will work more closely with the minister, with the premier, on all of these issues in the future,” he declared. In other words, this collaboration was not easy.
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The problem is that Mr. Legault is from Mr. Fitzgibbon’s school on this issue. They may not have agreed on the sustainability of the 3% cap on rate increases imposed on Hydro-Québec residential customers, but they did agree on using electricity massively to attract large foreign companies.
The Prime Minister has said it again and again: his way of enriching Quebecers is to favour companies that will offer wages of $50 an hour rather than $20 an hour, even if it means doing so to the detriment of SMEs. Not to mention the profits that will result from the sale of these blocks of electricity to these companies, even the Employers’ Council has warned that the drop in the price of renewable energy in the United States could soon eliminate Quebec’s comparative advantage.
Since the government is Hydro-Québec’s sole shareholder, it has the final say. After all, Mr. Sabia is just an employee. Except that he is not an employee like the others and must be treated with care.
He is no stranger. Whether at the Caisse de dépôt or at the Department of Finance Canada, he has dabbled in politics. He knows full well that the Legault government no longer has the popularity it once had and that a second resignation in a row at the head of the queen of Crown corporations, for practically the same reasons, would have a very bad effect.
In this first week of the parliamentary session, the opposition was obviously quick to add fuel to the fire, taking advantage of Mr. Sabia’s statements to mock the alleged economic nationalism of a government “which has sold our electricity at a discount to foreigners.”
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Christine Fréchette is undeniably a talented minister. At Immigration, she has not only demonstrated her ability to quickly master her files, but also learned to calm things down after the Prime Minister’s untimely statements.
After Mr. Legault had described as “suicidal” the reception of more than 50,000 permanent immigrants per year, she managed to raise this threshold to 60,000 without too much friction, by setting the condition of sufficient mastery of French, which was nevertheless considered impossible when the Prime Minister was tearing his shirt.
The change of direction on the closure of Roxham Road was a little more laborious, and it cannot be said that the brakes on temporary immigration lived up to the cries of alarm from her boss, but she at least gave the impression of knowing where she was going.
One wonders whether Mr. Legault, by refusing to let Mr. Fitzgibbon lead the debate on his bill, did not want to avoid a head-on collision between Mr. Sabia and his fiery minister, whose allergy to contradiction was chronic.
Mme Fréchette may be pugnacious, but she is less impulsive than her predecessor. However, she will need to be extremely adept at finding the “balance point” and navigating between the seemingly irreconcilable positions of the premier and the CEO of Hydro-Québec.
It’s already very uncomfortable to be stuck between a rock and a hard place. Let’s hope it’s not a hammer and an anvil instead.