Given the sad state in which their party finds itself and the possibility that Denis Coderre will take it over, we can understand the Liberals’ nostalgia for the Charest years, despite the bad memories that others have had of them.
From there to advising Prime Minister François Legault to draw inspiration from it in his relations with Ottawa, as Marc Tanguay did, there is however a margin. The memory of the interim leader of the Liberal Party of Quebec (PLQ) is somewhat selective.
It is true that Jean Charest began his mandate with great success. The agreement on financing health services signed in 2004 with the Paul Martin government provided for an increase in the federal contribution of 6% per year and exempted Quebec from any conditions.
Mr. Tanguay presents the Council of the Federation, created at the initiative of Quebec, as a great feat of arms of the Charest government, but its “Canadian diplomacy” has in no way modified the balance of power of Quebec against Ottawa . As soon as he had the chance, Stephen Harper reduced the growth of the Canada Health Transfer to 3%.
Either, the Legault government was sent to pasture by Justin Trudeau, who granted the provinces barely a sixth of what they demanded, but that of Philippe Couillard, even more unconditionally federalist than his predecessor, had not done so. better. Since 2004, the common front of the provinces that the Council of the Federation was supposed to consolidate has always ended up collapsing.
In fairness, the Charest government has had other successes, such as parental insurance or the harmonization of the GST and the QST, just as Mr. Legault’s government succeeded in extending Bill 101 to businesses falling under the federal jurisdiction.
This did not prevent MM. Charest and Harper to be at loggerheads throughout the time they were in power, even if Mr. Harper had a vision of federalism more respectful of the sharing of powers provided for by the Constitution than that of Mr. Trudeau.
Over the years, they have argued over just about every subject imaginable: the fiscal imbalance, the environment, the gun registry, young offenders, cultural cuts…
When circumstances forced them to appear together in public, whether at home or abroad, they were like cats and dogs. We were able to gauge Mr. Harper’s resentment when Mr. Charest wanted to become leader of the Conservative Party. He should have gone over his body.
Ultimately, relations between Quebec and Ottawa are undoubtedly neither more nor less harmonious today than they were then. The Charest government was no more successful than that of Mr. Legault in its attempt to control Ottawa’s spending power, except that Mr. Harper was significantly less spendy than Mr. Trudeau, to whom the notion of deficit is totally foreign.
Marc Tanguay is however right on one point: no matter what Jean Charest could say or do to defend what he believed to be the interests of Quebec, no one doubted the sincerity of his attachment to Canada, while the sovereignist past by François Legault will always make him suspect in the eyes of some. He who has drunk will drink, says the proverb.
When Paul St-Pierre Plamondon criticizes him for not forcing the game to obtain more powers in matters of immigration, for example by holding a referendum on the question, Mr. Legault replies that the only objective of the Parti Québécois (PQ) is to prove the incapacity of federalism to satisfy the needs of Quebec, but he himself could fall victim to this accusation, even if that was not his intention.
What’s more, CAQ voters have become supporters of Justin Trudeau, according to a recent Léger poll. There are 42% who would vote for the Liberal Party of Canada, 31% for the Bloc Québécois and 20% for the Conservative Party. Two years ago the figures were 31%, 45% and 12%.
We already knew that the majority of CAQ members would vote No in a referendum. From there to supporting a party that has always worked to erase the Quebec difference, there is a step that we did not think we would see the Coalition Avenir Québec (CAQ) take. The Trudeauist vision of Canada is totally incompatible with the autonomist project that it claims to defend.
This reversal, which is explained by the return to the fold of PQ voters who had moved to the CAQ, makes it imperative to prevent those who deserted the PLQ from also returning to their old loves, and the chicanery with the federal government is not the best way to achieve this.
In Ottawa too, we read the polls. Everyone knows that the cocoricos are an imposed figure for any prime minister of Quebec, but the CAQ voters will take care of calming the ardor of Mr. Legault.