The hills notebook | The Press

From Quebec to Ottawa, find out what caught the attention of our parliamentary correspondents this week.

Damn then!

Prime Minister François Legault did not like the controversy surrounding his party’s financing at all. During a press briefing, he let slip a decidedly unparliamentary word when he responded in English to a journalist from an English-speaking media outlet. “I make decisions that are not always supported by the entire population, but one thing I cannot accept is having my integrity questioned, shit ! » He announced that his party is renouncing popular financing. An idea “that we have been discussing for a long time” at the CAQ, he maintained. Really ? The CAQ was in favor until very recently of the idea of ​​raising the donation ceiling currently set at $100 per year, according to discussions last fall within the advisory committee of the Director General of Elections of Quebec (DGEQ). The general director of the CAQ, Brigitte Legault, maintains that all parties were in favor of an increase in the ceiling – which could be confirmed. She adds that her party had informed the DGEQ last Thursday that it had changed its mind and was pleading for the status quo.

35.2 million

The war chest amassed by the conservatives for the next election campaign “broke all records,” the political party boasted this week. This is more than double the 15 million collected by the Liberals. The last record, held by the Conservative Party, was 24.2 million in 2018. The political party collected more than 200,000 donations in 2023 during Pierre Poilievre’s first full year as leader. He sees this as proof of broad support for his “common sense plan”. However, there is still work to be done in Quebec, where the party has collected nearly 1,500 donations of $200 or more with a total value of almost $810,000.

Dark projections for the CAQ

We saw it at the start of the week: the Coalition Avenir Québec (CAQ) lost half of its support in one year and fell to 20% in voting intentions, compared to 32% for the Parti Québécois (PQ), according to a Pallas Data survey. The electoral projections site Qc125 even estimates that this result would only earn it 9 of the 125 seats in the National Assembly. The CAQ would be ranked fourth in terms of the number of seats, behind the PQ (67), the Liberal Party (28) and Québec solidaire (15). She would barely have more than the Conservative Party (6). The next general elections are still far away, but is François Legault starting to regret having reneged on his electoral promise to reform the voting system?

The writings remain…

Difficult week for François Legault. The Prime Minister nevertheless had in his bag something to respond to the leader in the polls, Paul St-Pierre Plamondon. At the Salon Bleu, the PQ leader asked Mr. Legault to “reassure Quebecers and exclude private companies from getting into the sale of electricity.” He says he is opposed to the “denationalization of Hydro-Québec”. The Prime Minister immediately reminded his opponent of what he himself wrote on the subject in his book Political orphans, in 2014. Then, he read the following passage, taken from pages 239 and 240 of Mr. Plamondon’s work: “Sweden is not afraid to question state monopolies. It thus introduced the private sector into the hydroelectricity sector. State intervention in the economy works best when it competes with the private sector. Quebec must look into the introduction of the private sector. ” Oops. François Legault maintained that under his leadership, “it will remain marginal, which will be done by the private sector”.

Perinatal mourning: poignant plea from an MP

Liberal MP Désirée McGraw succeeded this week in passing her bill aimed at proclaiming Quebec Perinatal Bereavement Awareness Day on October 15 of each year. A day to highlight “the deep pain” of these losses and “to offer comfort to the affected families”. It is rare for the government to agree to give the green light to an opposition bill. During the debates on adoption, the elected representative of Notre-Dame-de-Grâce delivered a poignant speech at the Salon bleu, opening up to a very personal chapter in her life. M^me McGraw described experiencing such grief, after losing her baby, Catherine, at 35 weeks pregnant. With emotion, she confided that she needed help afterwards and said she got involved with organizations to find solutions to ease the parents’ grief. “We never get over the loss of a child, but there are things we can do to better cope with it,” she expressed, in English, “her mother’s language”. Shows that trials sometimes lead to political action.

” It will be long ”

The leader of the Bloc Québécois, Yves-François Blanchet, showed signs of exasperation from the first day of the resumption of parliamentary work. “Mr President, this is going to be long. » The Bloc leader expressed his amazement after hearing the first exchanges between Conservative Party leader Pierre Poilievre and Prime Minister Justin Trudeau during the first question period in the House of Commons in more than six weeks. Indeed, it may be a long time before the next elections scheduled for October 2025, because all low blows are permitted between leaders. An example ? Pierre Poilievre notably asked Justin Trudeau if he had paid “the entire carbon tax corresponding to the 100 tonnes of emissions he sent into the atmosphere for his $80,000 vacation” to Jamaica during the vacation. Holidays. Justin Trudeau asked him why he muzzles MPs like Leslyn Lewis who calls for the abolition of the United Nations. Yes, it’s going to be long!

The quote of the week

The Charter is not an option and its preventive use is a way of saying that the Charter is optional.

Former Justice Minister David Lametti called for a change to the Canadian Constitution in his farewell speech in the House of Commons on Tuesday to prevent the notwithstanding clause from being used preemptively, as the Quebec to protect laws 21 and 96 from legal challenges. Alberta Premier Danielle Smith has not ruled out doing the same for her controversial new gender identity policy.

Who is the real Pierre Poilievre?

It is not Prime Minister Justin Trudeau that the New Democrats are attacking in a new ad this week, but Pierre Poilievre. The thirty-second video associates the Conservative leader with the cuts of Prime Ministers Doug Ford and Danielle Smith, in Ontario and Alberta. Pierre Poilievre’s photo appears on screen to dramatic music with a reminder that he voted against the dental program. The Conservatives are trying to court union votes in NDP ridings. “Mr. Poilievre says he wants to bring lots of solutions and says he wants to help workers, then the middle class, but when we look concretely at what the Conservatives are really doing, it doesn’t help the most deprived, it doesn’t help workers, it doesn’t help seniors and students,” said the deputy leader of the New Democratic Party, Alexandre Boulerice.