Québec solidaire expressed regret on Wednesday for the collapse of a “common front” with the Parti Québécois against the project for a third highway link, accusing leader Paul St-Pierre Plamondon of adopting an “electoralist and dishonest strategy” in the case.
“The Parti Québécois, no matter how much it tries to rectify, what it wants to do, what it [fait], it is opening the door to a change of position, it is opening the door to what one day they will say: “there could be a third motorway”. And that’s a serious setback,” said solidarity MP Sol Zanetti.
The day before, Mr. St-Pierre Plamondon refused to exclude at a press briefing (and despite numerous questions) the possibility of supporting a third motorway link in 2026. He took up his pen on X, formerly Twitter, for a few minutes later. He wrote, on the one hand, that his party “excludes” this possibility, but added, on the other hand, that the PQ could have to change its position by virtue of the work of the Caisse de dépôt et placement du Québec, responsible for studying the third link project.
“What is clear is that here he is saying that he has the same position as before, but that he will open the door to change,” observed Mr. Zanetti. “And that is problematic because what is going to make him change his mind, if not electoral reasons which are far from science and which are not honest towards the people to whom he has made believe that would he be a good defender of true sustainable mobility in Quebec? »
A “dishonest” strategy
The supportive MP saw in “this openness to a change of position” a “serious step backwards” and “an electoralist and dishonest strategy” on the part of the PQ. “What element would cause them to change position? Will science change? Will the issue of greenhouse gases suddenly change? asked Mr. Zanetti. “Political coherence means saying: we want ecology, we want sustainable mobility and then, cuddly, we are against a third motorway link and that is not the [Caisse] which will make us change our minds. »
The day before, Mr. St-Pierre Plamondon had declared that there was no question for the PQ of immediately demanding — from an ideological point of view — that a new link between Quebec and Lévis be reserved for transport in common. “The only guiding principle, which is not ideological, but which is founding in the PQ, is that we consult a large number of experts, we consult the population, and it is on this basis that “we take what we believe to be the best project,” argued the PQ leader.
“What the Parti Québécois does, replied Mr. Zanetti, is that it says: “we are perhaps going to put our values aside”. That’s what he’s saying. And that’s a very negative signal. »
If QS attacked the PQ so strongly, it is because it is sorry to lose an ally in the fight for the third highway link project, added solidarity activist Gabriel Nadeau-Dubois. “We, when we think we are counting on allies, on an issue as important for the region as mobility and the third link, and suddenly this common front is shaken, I understand [mes collègues élus à Québec] to ask yourself: “so, who can we really work with in the Quebec region, in the fight against climate change?” »
Asked about the PQ position, the interim leader of the Liberal Party, Marc Tanguay, for his part responded with a “no” when a journalist asked him if the PQ position was clear. “There seem to be contradictions. He was against it. There, he is no longer completely against it and he would perhaps even be for it. So, I’m going to let him sort it out himself,” he said. At the PLQ, “we are convinced that, for the mobility issue, we need to have structuring transport,” he added. “We are not going to change our position in relation to what the Caisse de dépôt et placement could propose. »
— With Alexandre Robillard