Posted at 5:00 a.m.
François Legault will not be the only one who wants to put money back in the wallets of Quebecers. The leader of the Liberal Party, Dominique Anglade, is also committed to this front three months before the election campaign by promising specific recurring aid intended for the middle class to help it cope with galloping inflation.
The Liberal troops are meeting this Saturday in the General Council in Montreal and the leader has chosen to do things differently by filing her electoral platform now. At the heart of it, a “flagship measure” to lighten the burden of Quebecers who are coping with a sharp rise in the cost of living.
Dominique Anglade will reveal this Saturday the form that this aid will take, but already we can confirm that it will not be a check. The PLQ criticized the Prime Minister for having promised a second check for $500 after the elections, in November or December. The head of the CAQ also telegraphed a promise of tax cuts.
The opposition parties have accused the CAQ government of “buying” votes by inviting Quebecers “to vote on the right side” as Maurice Duplessis did at the time.
PHOTO CATHERINE LEFEBVRE, SPECIAL COLLABORATION
Dominique Anglade, during his investiture evening in Saint-Henri–Saint-Anne, Friday evening
During his investiture in Saint-Henri–Saint-Anne on Friday evening, Dominique Anglade repeated the formula by asking the compact crowd, gathered in a small bar in Saint-Henri, if the voters “say yes to Maurice Duplessis”, this to which the activists replied: “No! »
Mitigate inflation
The fight to dampen inflation has been at the center of Liberal interventions in recent weeks. Ex-finance minister Carlos Leitão had plenty of ice time at the Blue Room. Despite his announced departure, he contributed to the development of the party platform.
It is also the MNA for Robert-Baldwin who will lead the technical briefing session on the content of the platform this Saturday, along with a rookie, Fred Beauchemin, former general manager and head of capital markets of the Banque Scotia, who will run for the votes in Marguerite-Bourgeoys.
This should be seen as a sign that the Liberals want to reposition themselves as the party of the economy and “bust the myth” according to which the Legault government is doing well in this area, according to those around Ms.me England.
A strategy that is no stranger to the harsh criticism sent to the chief caquist during the end-of-session report on Friday. “Our desire is to be able to anticipate what is coming, which François Legault has failed to do. And I would like to remind him that when we told him that inflation would go to 5.6%, he told us that the Liberal Party was living on another planet,” complained Dominique Anglade.
“You can’t boast [d’être] the party of economics when you don’t understand the fundamentals of economics,” she added.
The Liberals are also counting on the candidacy, in Notre-Dame-de-Grâce, of Désirée McGraw, named Young Global Leader at the 2010 World Economic Forum, to swell its ranks. The PLQ is looking to add a third “big name” to its economic team. In 2014, Philippe Couillard presented an “economic trio” with the candidacies of Carlos Leitão, Martin Coiteux and Jacques Daoust.
The “ECO project” brought back to the fore
A full section of the platform will be devoted to the “ECO project”, which aims in particular to nationalize green hydrogen.
Dominique Anglade presented her green economy project with great fanfare at the last congress in November, but she has said very little about it since.
The PLQ will promise a six-fold increase in water royalties, while its ECO project indicated that they wanted to double them. At the end of the session, Minister Benoit Charette tabled a bill aimed at revising “the fees payable for the use of water” in order to make it an electoral commitment.