It took less than ten minutes after the polls closed on Monday evening for the Quebec media to almost simultaneously announce the victory of the Coalition avenir Québec (CAQ) and predict a majority government.
” This is unheard of ! launches, stunned, Blaise Gagnon, journalism teacher in the art and media technology program at Cégep de Jonquière.
As in the 2021 federal elections, it was Noovo Info that got the ball rolling on the French-speaking side by announcing at 8:08 p.m. that the CAQ would form the next government and have a majority. Within two minutes, TVA and Radio-Canada followed suit, followed by other media.
It must be said that even before the launch of the election campaign, the polls already predicted a hands-down victory for the CAQ. The big question was who would form the official opposition in the National Assembly. And again, the suspense was short-lived. Noovo Info announced at 8:18 p.m. that it would be the Quebec Liberal Party.
No suspense
“Zero suspense. It necessarily removes interest, viewers had to quickly pick up, ”comments Patrick White, professor at the School of Media at UQAM, convinced that the ratings will take a hit.
Drawing on their extensive experience in the field, the hosts of the two major networks TVA and Radio-Canada, Pierre Bruneau and Patrice Roy, alternated with ease between political commentary, expert predictions, testimonials from candidates and journalists’ analyzes on field.
Pierre Bruneau hosted his last election evening before officially retiring. For the occasion, he was surrounded by his usual collaborators, analysts Mario Dumont, Paul Larocque, Emmanuelle Latraverse and Jean-Marc Léger.
On social networks, many have rightly criticized the fact that it is always the same team. Others welcomed the fact that for the first time more voice was given to the public. Patrick White sees the channel’s desire to get even closer to its audience, as a “popular” channel. Blaise Gagnon, for his part, doubts the real contribution of this addition.
On the Radio-Canada special, Patrice Roy was surrounded by analysts Sébastien Bovet, Alec Castonguay, Chantal Hébert, Manon Cyr, Luc Ferrandez and Régis Labeaume. “We find a solid team, and there is an effort to make room for the regions, in particular with the colorful mayor of Chibougamau,” notes Mr. Gagnon.
Faced with these “two well-oiled machines”, Noovo Info’s election night had nothing to be ashamed of, according to the two experts consulted, who underline the “great performance” of the new head of antenna, Marie-Christine Bergeron. They also appreciate the different tone, the varied and lesser-known analysts invited to the set. Among them: Antonine Yaccarini, Claudel Pétrin-Desrosiers, Victor Henriquez, Philippe J. Fournier, Sébastien Proulx, Martine St-Victor, Yves Boisvert and Dominic Vallières.
Social networks
In the opinion of the experts, Noovo Info has also stood out by offering its “parallel show”, a program broadcast live on its social networks just before the channel’s special program. The formula had already been tested during the federal elections last year.
At the animation, Émilie Clavel discussed with several speakers about subjects that affect young people more and which were left aside during the campaign. We also showed behind-the-scenes preparations for election night.
Patrick White also notes that the network is one of the only ones to have offered content for its social networks, including TikTok and Instagram. Platforms that were generally used little or not at all by the media during this election night.
“It shows that these kinds of events remain unmissable televised appointments. Three quarters of Quebecers still have a cable subscription. However, the media would benefit from investing in these digital platforms to experiment with different formats in order to interest young people more, according to him.
Caution
Even if the results came out quickly, Radio-Canada showed caution this year by changing the way it presents its results as the votes were counted. Instead of indicating that a candidate is “elected” or “re-elected”, the mention “forecast” was added just before, “for the sake of accuracy”.
“The municipal elections in Quebec have shown us that, even if our projections are made in an extremely serious manner and that they turn out to be accurate in almost all cases, there is still a risk of error since these are precisely projections. . These errors, even extremely rare, have significant effects on the people concerned and […] on trust in the media,” explained the Director General of Information Luce Julien on Monday morning.
Recall that in November 2021, Radio-Canada and TVA had wrongly announced the victory of Marie-Josée Savard at the mayor of Quebec, early in the evening. The next day, the two main French-language channels apologized, and Radio-Canada indicated that it would review its “decision-making process”.
The broadcaster had made the same mistake in the 2007 general election by wrongly announcing the defeat of Jean Charest, candidate in Sherbrooke. This event also gave rise to this formulation – now cult – by Pierre Bruneau: “Rigueur, rigour, rigour”.