Certain recent events suggest that the Coalition Avenir Québec (CAQ) government has lost its control. We can include the resurrection of the third link, whose corpse was still warm, and the famous subsidy intended to bring the Kings from Los Angeles to Quebec. The latest polls even show that the Parti Québécois is ahead of the CAQ in voting intentions, a clear sign of popular discontent. Several analysts highlight the loss of connection between the CAQ and the population. I offer here another reading which requires a few steps back.
Prime Minister Legault likes to repeat that he defines himself as a pragmatist, and this impression remains well anchored in the population. However, when we look at the entire work of the CAQ since it has governed, we see a deep ideological base. The intention underlying all the policies put forward by the CAQ seems directed towards one thing: the systematic dismantling of the Quebec social model patiently constructed since the Quiet Revolution. The following list represents only a small portion of the evidence.
Let’s start with the two main missions of the State, health and education. The strategy is very clear. It is about demonstrating that public services simply do not work. How ? Nothing could be easier, we just have to continually modify the institutional structures, than to intervene at the slightest opportunity to discredit the actors present, in a word, than to undermine the system at its base. Minister Dubé can thus justify the creation of his Santé Québec agency and the nevertheless insane expansion of the role of the private sector in health.
Meanwhile, citizens still do not have a family doctor and surgical waiting lists are growing. Bernard Drainville’s bill is not left out. The minister gives himself the power to fire anyone who does not say the same thing as him. The minister also intervenes at every turn and in every way (cell phones in class, prayer rooms, intimidation, etc.). Meanwhile, the place of the private sector in education is not questioned, teachers are leaving the boat and students are being left behind.
In terms of housing and land occupation, Bill 31 of Minister France-Élaine Duranceau passes the right of tenants to transfer their lease to the mill despite the protests of groups representing the most deprived, in the midst of the crisis, and plans to allow cities to disregard their own planning regulations, which opens the door to collusion and chaotic land use planning, with no recourse for citizens. When it comes to justice, the government is abandoning the system to its own devices, creating unacceptable delays that lead to the acquittal of criminals. That’s without counting his endless arguments with the judges.
Transport, investments and identity
As for transport, nothing is going well, neither in public transport, for which we are considering the creation of yet another agency, nor in road transport, where the infrastructure deficit continues to rise ever higher. Aside from the Réseau express métropolitain, decided and undertaken under a previous government, the CAQ has accomplished absolutely nothing in public transportation. It promises a lot without delivering, and it doesn’t even invest enough to support the existing public transit network.
Since we are talking about investments, Minister Pierre Fitzgibbon disguises himself as Santa Claus and distributes billions to foreign companies so that they can come and create paying jobs here for non-existent workers. In terms of taxation, we are introducing tax cuts that will mainly benefit the wealthiest and we are sending checks to lots of people who don’t need them, and then pretending to no longer have any room for maneuver to help the poorest. or honorably pay state employees, except elected officials, whose work cannot be compared to anything else.
Finally, we cannot ignore the question of culture and identity. With the Quiet Revolution, Quebec began to open up to the world, develop and export its culture. We were increasingly seen as a welcoming and unique people in North America. In barely five years, the CAQ has succeeded in making us a people closed in on itself, almost navel-gazing. She constantly talks about protecting the French language, but obtains no convincing results, except that of alienating everyone, including English-speaking universities and foreign students.
The common trait in all these decisions and policies could not be clearer: the dismantling of the Quebec social model, brick by brick. In fact, the CAQ has no legitimacy to act in this way; it was certainly not elected on such a basis. She has therefore chosen to create a diversion as often as possible, to distract us with peccadilloes, while she advances her destructive project.
As for the rise of the Parti Québécois in voting intentions, it almost constitutes a blessing for the CAQ. It truly creates a single adversary, rather than four, against whom it will be easy, when the time comes, to raise the specter of separation and/or referendum to bring voters home. We’ve all been in this bad movie many times. It is time to unmask the CAQ to reveal what it is, a party of businessmen, and what it does, entertain us while it destroys us.