The 12 Labors of the Liberals | The Press

The Liberal Party of Quebec must rebuild itself. After a crushing defeat in the last ballot, the official opposition is looking for a new leader, but also a raison d’être. What does it mean to be liberal in 2023? Like the 12 labors of Asterix, The Press surveyed the party to target 12 hardships to overcome in order to get back on its feet.

#1 – Revisit “great values”

The interim leader of the Quebec Liberal Party (PLQ), Marc Tanguay, is convinced of this: the party’s values ​​must be the “cement of the project” for its revival. “The party is 155 years old. It’s not because we were very lucky for 155 years. It’s because we had values ​​that stuck to the Quebec reality,” he says. But the list of these values ​​is long and often universal. Individual freedoms, economic development, social justice, identification with Quebec, environmental protection, intergenerational equity… Mr. Tanguay suggests taking them one by one and combining them with concrete proposals. Of all these values, former Minister Christine St-Pierre believes that we must focus on two founding principles: the economy and freedoms. “We must even accentuate the focus on the economy,” she adds.

#2 – Renew the militant base

The former chairman of the Liberal political committee, Jérôme Turcotte, is sounding the alarm. According to him, the “signals of decay” from the militant base were stark five years ago, and the situation has not improved. “It’s quite a job. The militant base is in freefall [et] the liberal machine no longer exists”, says the one who insists that the party do an important job of introspection. The president of the PLQ, Rafaël Primeau-Ferraro, affirms that there are currently 20,000 members in the party. They were slightly less numerous before the last elections. “But the health of a political party is not measured only by its membership,” he said. It is also reflected in its mobilization, in its bodies and in the events it organizes. Mr. Primeau-Ferraro promises debates of ideas during the year 2023.

#3 – Dare to debate

Jérôme Turcotte believes that we must “relearn how to debate ideas in the Liberal Party”. According to him, the “culture of unity” that has often characterized this party – notorious for not washing its dirty laundry in public – has transformed into a culture of uniformity and conformity. “Because we have been a party of government for so long, we have acquired a deep understanding that being at odds with the parliamentary wing gives a lot of gas to the media controversy. But having contradictory points of view allows us to redefine our positions. [Ne pas le faire] undermines militancy,” he said. According to Mr. Turcotte, debating is an essential ingredient in the renewal of members so that the party avoids embarking on the path of “sustainable marginalization”.

#4 – Getting out of Montreal

More than ever, the Liberal Party is associated with Montreal, where the overwhelming majority of its parliamentary caucus is concentrated. But it will be necessary to leave the metropolis if the official opposition wishes to win back the electorate of the regions. Ronald Poupart, who has advised former prime ministers and who has been an activist for the party since the 1960s, wants the PLQ to embark on the path of a policy conference to review its political positions. This congress, which could be held outside the major centers, should be preceded by a series of consultations with regional militant associations, he maintains. “We cannot continue to centralize everything in Quebec, Montreal and Gatineau and leave the regions without help or support. We’re going nowhere with that, ”warns Mr. Poupart.

#5 – Passing the torch

Dominique Anglade gone, the Liberals will have to choose a new leader. If some – like Ronald Poupart – want the party to first give itself the time to define its political orientations, others believe that we should not delay in choosing the next one vis-à-vis Prime Minister François Legault. “There’s a lot of work to do and it goes by quickly, four years,” recalls Christine St-Pierre. The former MP wants the next leader to add emotion to his political proposals, so that people feel caught up in what he puts on the table. “Jean Charest, with his Plan Nord, he captured people’s emotions. It will take us a person who has charisma and who manages to attract all generations to her, ”she says.

#6 – Get started on identity issues

The Liberal Party has had difficulty navigating in recent years on identity issues, such as secularism and the protection of French. According to the interim chief, Marc Tanguay, it is first and foremost “a communication challenge”. In terms of protecting French, for example, the Liberals prefer to improve the quality of French taught at the elementary or secondary level, where Bill 101 applies, rather than imposing restrictions on CEGEP. According to Jérôme Turcotte, the PLQ must go further to reconnect with the Francophone electorate, without denying its values. “If, in the eyes of the electorate, the Liberal Party is the party of minorities, Anglophones and Montrealers, that is useless and we are wasting our time. We have to win back people’s attention and get Quebecers to identify with our political offer,” says the man who wants identity issues to be treated with as much interest as economic questions.

#7 – Canadians, yes, but Quebecers first

The former president of the Liberal political commission Jérôme Turcotte wants his party to dust off the policy of affirmation of Quebec and Canadian relations Quebecers, our way of being Canadians, which had quickly been shelved by the government of Philippe Couillard. “Independence is no longer on the agenda. We have to find a position where we are able to have clear, firm demands, and form a common front with the other parties on issues such as federal health transfers or on the question of having more powers in immigration,” says -he. “The challenge of the Liberal Party is to be the hyphen that is able to say both that we must better defend the French language with robust measures and that there is systemic racism in Quebec. . We can do both,” says Mr. Turcotte.

#8 – Talk about… sovereignty!

Jérôme Turcotte believes that one of the greatest threats to the French language in Quebec is the growing hegemony of digital web giants (like Netflix and other content distribution platforms) in the lives of Quebecers. As such, the Liberal activist is sorry that the issue is mainly debated in Ottawa. “There was a time when, in Quebec, we had a clear claim in terms of cultural sovereignty. It was the very idea of [l’ancien premier ministre libéral] Robert Bourassa,” says Mr. Turcotte. According to him, the CAQ government “is asleep on the gas on the functional claims that allow to broaden the field of action of Quebec within the current constitutional framework”. The PLQ must reclaim these kinds of issues, he said, and avoid considering them as not part of the “real business”.

#9 – Take a step towards the center

Mr. Turcotte believes that “one of the deepest threats hanging over the Liberal Party is to go from a party that likes to win to a party that wants to be right”. On the two axes that define Quebec politics (left-right/federalist-sovereignist), the CAQ is the only party that occupies, according to him, “the immense space” for a political formation that is neither too independentist nor too federalist, neither too right nor too left. “There, we are four opposition parties which share a niche of 15% of voters. A party must dare to take the step towards the centre. If the Liberal Party decides to exchange its desire to win for a desire to be right and defends a federal system in the status quo, without any consideration for the identity concerns of Quebec, the risk of marginalization is real. “, he believes.

#10 – Do not forget the gray heads

Who says revival of a political party often says renewal and rejuvenation of its members and its candidates. In recent months, the arrival of a new body of politicians on the municipal scene, such as Catherine Fournier in Longueuil, Stéphane Boyer in Laval or Évelyne Beaudin in Sherbrooke, among others, has been hailed as a breath of fresh air in town halls. Former MP Christine St-Pierre underlines the contribution of these new elected officials and hopes that this trend will also be part of her party. But according to her, the search for novelty must not relegate to the background the contribution of the alumni in the revival of the PLQ. “We must not forget the gray hair too! You have to go find [des gens] who have a little more of a vision of the history of Quebec, how it was built and how we evolved within Canada,” she said.

#11 – All minority

When he analyzes the demographic forces that make up Quebec society, Jérôme Turcotte finds an element shared by all: the feeling of being a minority. This is true first of all for the francophone majority, which forms a minority in North America. This is just as true for English-speaking Quebecers, who are a minority in the province, as well as for the newcomers, then the Aboriginal peoples, who for their part are “not only a minority, but who have also experienced the persecution of colonialism and who live in a system that has not yet managed to update itself,” says Mr. Turcotte. According to him, the PLQ must defend all these minorities, listen to their fears without invalidating them, then find a point of political balance with them.

#12 – Find a cause

In the end, concludes veteran activist Ronald Poupart, it is the members of the party (and those who will join them) who will have the final word in this list of the trials to be overcome towards the revival of the Liberal Party of Quebec. Anyone who has known the different phases of the party, from Jean Lesage to Jean Charest, believes that a fundamental variable has changed in recent decades: people identify less with political parties than in the past. “The activism of the 1960s and 1970s no longer exists. People, more and more, want to defend a cause,” he says. It is this cause that remains to be defined.