Quebec 2022 Election

[mileslunn]

Largely a snoozer at this point as seems highly unlikely CAQ don't get re-elected, but battle for second place could get interesting.

CAQ: Barring some major scandal or mistake, I don't see how they do not get re-elected.  That being said numbers have come down to earth a bit and aren't in high 40s/low 50s anymore so share of popular vote may not be that much above the 37% they got in 2018.  But with opposition so badly divided, should easily win a majority.

PLQ: Party's raison d'etre was to stop another referendum and was never coherent in ideology with people across political spectrum.  Fact Charest now running for Conservative leader and Mulcair former NDP leader in same party says a lot.  They seem to increasingly becoming an Anglophone and Allophone party with very limited support amongst Francophones.

QS: They may come in second, but very distant and support very concentrated in urban cores and university towns.  They appeal to your left wing millennials, but too left wing to make big gains.

PQ: They may be in their death spiral.  Left flank gone over to QS who are pro sovereignty but progressive while right flank mostly to CAQ who are nationalist but not separatist (I think at this point most realize a sovereign Quebec is not coming anytime soon if ever).  They may hold some in Gaspesie region and perhaps even North Shore which are quite traditionalist but cannot see beyond that.

PCQ: Two polls put them in second place and now in high teens maybe low 20s.  No doubt Eric Duhaime being a popular radio show host helps.  Any seats won probably in Quebec City region and areas nearby, so similar to federal Tories.  Also could split votes enough that deny CAQ many seats although not likely enough to cost majority.  At same time if make it through to Fall with no further covid restrictions, that might sap a lot of their support as I believe much of their support is over opposition to covid restrictions which are mostly gone by now so as that finds into rear view could see many return to CAQ.

[Poirot]

We are in the sixth wave but the government doesn't seem to want to reinstate restrictions. Usually the summer is a more tame period for the pandemic so in September it shouldn't be a big problem. In mid-April the plan was to lift the restriction on wearing maks in indoor public places. Many experts say we should keep the mask. If we do Duhaime could denounce this restriction and we would would be the only place in North America requiring masks.

Angus Reid had a poll for all provinces. For Quebec it had CAQ at 33%, PLQ and PCQ at 19%, QS at 16% and PQ 9%. It was done before the budget which gave 500$ to every adult earning less than $100,000.

https://angusreid.org/provincial-spotlight-march-2022/

What I find interesting about the numbers is the movements between parties from the 2018 vote.
CAQ retains two thirds of their 2018 vote  but lose 26% to PCQ and 4% to PQ. PQ only retains 43% of their vote, losing 28% to CAQ, 15% to PCQ and 11% to QS.

CAQ also gains just over 10% of the QS and PLQ 2018 voters. So CAQ has become the governing center party option, leaving traditional party of PQ and PLQ in trouble while the two more extreme options of QS and PCQ fight for the discontent and outspoken opposition.

QS retains 72% of its vote, losing around 10% to CAQ and PCQ, and 4% to PQ.  PLQ retains 71% of it's past voters. losing 12% to CAQ, 9% to PCQ and 4% to QS. There are some people who have pitched the idea of forming a new political party to defend the interests of non-francophones. If it happens it's not good news for the PLQ but it could also be a fringe thing if they have no money or high profile people supporting it.

[Poirot]

Eric Duhaime has chosen to run in Chauveau in Quebec city region. It was Gerard Deltell's provincial riding. His campaign director will be former Conservative federal minister Josée Verner.  He also has the support of Senator Boisvenu (Charest supporter) and Yves Lévesque former Trois-Rivières mayor and Poilievre supporter.

It has been a quick rise for Duhaime. The party is doing well in fundraising and it has 57,000 members. Duhaime said Chauveau has the most members.

In Quebec City, the PCQ is against the tramway project. It proposes a bridge between Quebec City and Lévis instead of the CAQ tunnel.

Article in English on Duhaime.
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/montreal/quebec-conservative-party-covid-19-eric-duhaime-1.6415046

[RogueBeaver]

Update on open seats: Véronique Hivon announced this morning she won't run again, as expected. Joliette should be a CAQ pickup. In response to the CHSLD scandal Danielle McCann and Marguerite Blais are being retired. More PLQ and PQ big names are also expected to retire.

[DL]

Eric Duhaime has chosen to run in Chauveau in Quebec city region. It was Gerard Deltell's provincial riding. His campaign director will be former Conservative federal minister Josée Verner.  He also has the support of Senator Boisvenu (Charest supporter) and Yves Lévesque former Trois-Rivières mayor and Poilievre supporter.

It has been a quick rise for Duhaime. The party is doing well in fundraising and it has 57,000 members. Duhaime said Chauveau has the most members.

In Quebec City, the PCQ is against the tramway project. It proposes a bridge between Quebec City and Lévis instead of the CAQ tunnel.

Article in English on Duhaime.
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/montreal/quebec-conservative-party-covid-19-eric-duhaime-1.6415046

I suspect that the challenge for PCQ is that all the seats they would target are currently CAQ seats and right now CAQ and Legault are still very popular. In 2018 the CAQ won Chauveau by 25 points! If and when the CAQ and Legault become unpopular there could be an opportunity for the the PCQ to gain protest votes and possibly win seats. But how do they win any CAQ seats in an election that is likely to be a huge CAQ landslide?

[beesley]

So how many of the PQ 10 will still be in the legislature? Catherine Fournier has already left the legislature; Sylvain Roy is an independent and Veronique Hivon, Sylvain Gaudreault, Harold LeBel (also an indie) and Lorraine Richard have already announced their retirements. Martin Ouellet hasn't announced, but Megane Perry Melancon, Joel Arseneau and Pascal Berube are running. So in answer to the question, just one (Berube) is a not unreasonable bet, but I suppose neither is four.

[RogueBeaver]

Hilarious: the 2 new neo-Equality parties are already squabbling. One is Balarama Holness' Mouvement Québec, the other is Townships lawyer Colin Standish's Parti Canadien.

[Poirot]

So how many of the PQ 10 will still be in the legislature? Catherine Fournier has already left the legislature; Sylvain Roy is an independent and Veronique Hivon, Sylvain Gaudreault, Harold LeBel (also an indie) and Lorraine Richard have already announced their retirements. Martin Ouellet hasn't announced, but Megane Perry Melancon, Joel Arseneau and Pascal Berube are running. So in answer to the question, just one (Berube) is a not unreasonable bet, but I suppose neither is four.

Projection sites give 1. Bérubé has a personal vote that others might not have.

[Poirot]

Hilarious: the 2 new neo-Equality parties are already squabbling. One is Balarama Holness' Mouvement Québec, the other is Townships lawyer Colin Standish's Parti Canadien.

Which one has a better chance to do well. The Parti Canadien (PaCQ) has not an official leader yet (or will it be Standish) so maybe it can attract someone well known. Holness ran for Montreal mayor so from where the population is. The alliance of municipal parties to give a third option to the two main candidates didn't go well so I wouldn't trust Holness if the two parties merged.

I don't think the new parties will be included in polls so we need to check if Others move or the Liberal decrease.

[Poirot]

We had a list of PQ members not running again.

For the Liberals  members retiring so far:

Island of Montreal
Lise Thériault (Anjou-Louis-Riel)
Christine St-Pierre (Acadie)
Hélène David (Marguerite-Bourgeoys)
David Birnbaum (D’Arcy-McGee)

Laval
Francine Charbonneau (Mille-Îles)
Jean Rousselle (Vimont)
Monique Sauvé (Fabre)

Montérégie
Gaétan Barrette (La Pinière)
Nicole Ménard (Laporte)

Québec Solidaire loses Catherine Dorion (Taschereau).
Claire Samson (Iberville) was elected with CAQ but later joined Parti Conservateur will not be a candidate.

CAQ has also some retirement.
Suzanne Dansereau (Verchères)
Danielle McCann (Sanguinet)
Marguerite Blais (Prévost)
Denis Tardif (Rivière-du-Loup–Témiscouata)
Emilie Foster (Charlevoix-Côte-de-Beaupré)

It seems women are overrepresented in members not running.

[Poirot]

Eric Duhaime has chosen to run in Chauveau in Quebec city region. It was Gerard Deltell's provincial riding. His campaign director will be former Conservative federal minister Josée Verner.  He also has the support of Senator Boisvenu (Charest supporter) and Yves Lévesque former Trois-Rivières mayor and Poilievre supporter.

It has been a quick rise for Duhaime. The party is doing well in fundraising and it has 57,000 members. Duhaime said Chauveau has the most members.

In Quebec City, the PCQ is against the tramway project. It proposes a bridge between Quebec City and Lévis instead of the CAQ tunnel.

Article in English on Duhaime.
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/montreal/quebec-conservative-party-covid-19-eric-duhaime-1.6415046

I suspect that the challenge for PCQ is that all the seats they would target are currently CAQ seats and right now CAQ and Legault are still very popular. In 2018 the CAQ won Chauveau by 25 points! If and when the CAQ and Legault become unpopular there could be an opportunity for the the PCQ to gain protest votes and possibly win seats. But how do they win any CAQ seats in an election that is likely to be a huge CAQ landslide?

The party would need high voter concentration.
The son of Léger has published some numbers by administrative regions from the polls done since the start of the year (I imagine to have a sample big enough).

The PCQ does better in Chaudière-Appalaches with 27%, Capitale Nationale with 22% and Centre du Québec with 18%.
In all regions CAQ is over 40% except Montreal. It has 57% in Lanaudière, 52% Laurentides and 48% in Montérégie.
In Montreal, the PLQ has 36%, CAQ 27% and QS 15%.

[Poirot]

The latest Léger poll has the CAQ in dominant position. It gets 46% of voting intentions, followed by the PLQ at 18%, PCQ 14%, QS 13% and PQ 8%.

By gender, CAQ voter is more female, PLQ and QS have an even male and female vote, PCQ and PQ are more male. Female vote is CAQ 50% followed by PLQ at 18%. Male vote CAQ 41%, PLQ 18%.

By age CAQ dominates the 55 years and older group with a big 65% followed by Liberals at 17% with the other parties in single digit. In the 35 to 54 year old, CAQ has 31%, PCQ is close at 28% and PLQ 21%.  QS is first among 18 to 34 year old with 33%, CAQ 29%, PLQ 15%, PCQ 11%. If the older folks get out to vote more, CAQ could get more support than polls show.

Francophone voters: CAQ 53, QS 14, PCQ 12, PQ 10, PLQ 9.
Non francophone: PLQ 48%, PCQ 19%, CAQ 18%, QS 8%.
I don't know if it's a smaller sample blip but was surprised to see PCQ doing better with the non francophone group than francophone.

In the Quebec City metro census region, CAQ eads with 43% with PCQ second at 25%, QS at 16%, PLQ and PQ at 8%.
Greater Montreal census region, CAQ 40, PLQ 25, QS 14, PCQ 12, PQ 7.
Rest of Quebec, CAQ 53, PCQ 13, PLQ and QS 12, PQ 9.

[brucejoel99]

The story of Quebec right now basically seems like a party figured out that if they offered Quebecers nationalism without separatism's baggage, federalists & separatists alike would flock to them & crown them the head of a one-party province.

[MaxQue]

The latest Léger poll has the CAQ in dominant position. It gets 46% of voting intentions, followed by the PLQ at 18%, PCQ 14%, QS 13% and PQ 8%.

By gender, CAQ voter is more female, PLQ and QS have an even male and female vote, PCQ and PQ are more male. Female vote is CAQ 50% followed by PLQ at 18%. Male vote CAQ 41%, PLQ 18%.

By age CAQ dominates the 55 years and older group with a big 65% followed by Liberals at 17% with the other parties in single digit. In the 35 to 54 year old, CAQ has 31%, PCQ is close at 28% and PLQ 21%.  QS is first among 18 to 34 year old with 33%, CAQ 29%, PLQ 15%, PCQ 11%. If the older folks get out to vote more, CAQ could get more support than polls show.

Francophone voters: CAQ 53, QS 14, PCQ 12, PQ 10, PLQ 9.
Non francophone: PLQ 48%, PCQ 19%, CAQ 18%, QS 8%.
I don't know if it's a smaller sample blip but was surprised to see PCQ doing better with the non francophone group than francophone.

In the Quebec City metro census region, CAQ eads with 43% with PCQ second at 25%, QS at 16%, PLQ and PQ at 8%.
Greater Montreal census region, CAQ 40, PLQ 25, QS 14, PCQ 12, PQ 7.
Rest of Quebec, CAQ 53, PCQ 13, PLQ and QS 12, PQ 9.

The PCQ had pretty much endorsed opposing language laws, as government overreach.

[DL]

Its really quite extraordinary how the Parti Quebecois was the a major party in Quebec politics for the last 50 years and was the government as recently as 2014 - and now they are polling in single digits and are likely to be wiped off the map! This is like what happened to the Union Nationale in 1973 when they lost all their seats. 

[Oryxslayer]

The story of Quebec right now basically seems like a party figured out that if they offered Quebecers nationalism without separatism's baggage, federalists & separatists alike would flock to them & crown them the head of a one-party province.

More that the modern generations were ready to move on from that debate, and had stopped identifying with those labels. So when a party can along that abandoned those labels in a way that clearly left the debate in the past...

[DL]

The story of Quebec right now basically seems like a party figured out that if they offered Quebecers nationalism without separatism's baggage, federalists & separatists alike would flock to them & crown them the head of a one-party province.

More that the modern generations were ready to move on from that debate, and had stopped identifying with those labels. So when a party can along that abandoned those labels in a way that clearly left the debate in the past...

And yet at the federal level Quebec is still captive to the old federalist LPC vs separatist BQ. It looked for a while like the NDP could break that mold in Quebec federally but now its back to the same old same old

[mileslunn]

The story of Quebec right now basically seems like a party figured out that if they offered Quebecers nationalism without separatism's baggage, federalists & separatists alike would flock to them & crown them the head of a one-party province.

More that the modern generations were ready to move on from that debate, and had stopped identifying with those labels. So when a party can along that abandoned those labels in a way that clearly left the debate in the past...

And yet at the federal level Quebec is still captive to the old federalist LPC vs separatist BQ. It looked for a while like the NDP could break that mold in Quebec federally but now its back to the same old same old

I would say in Quebec you are seeing more your urban vs. rural split as opposed to traditional separatist vs. federalist.  Urban nationalist like Hochelaga and Sherbrooke have Liberal MPs.  Liberals winning in same type of areas they win in Ontario while BQ mostly in areas that would vote Conservative in Ontario and Conservatives in around Quebec City region.  I think BQ rebound was more NDP not an option and for those upset with Liberals.  Tories going into 2019 had a real chance to breakthrough in rural Quebec, but blew it big time as Scheer was a horrible fit for province.

BQ federally is more centrist than they were in 90s and most BQ voters are CAQ provincially not PQ.  It seems PCQ is now becoming home of most Conservative voters although many went CAQ in 2018.

[Oryxslayer]

The story of Quebec right now basically seems like a party figured out that if they offered Quebecers nationalism without separatism's baggage, federalists & separatists alike would flock to them & crown them the head of a one-party province.

More that the modern generations were ready to move on from that debate, and had stopped identifying with those labels. So when a party can along that abandoned those labels in a way that clearly left the debate in the past...

And yet at the federal level Quebec is still captive to the old federalist LPC vs separatist BQ. It looked for a while like the NDP could break that mold in Quebec federally but now its back to the same old same old

This ignores the fact that the BQ basically ditched their old platform and tied themselves at the hip to the CAQ and a brand of 'provincial liaison.' So yeah, like Miles said, the BQ are not getting votes because they are separatist, more because they are not the Liberals, and still more culturally viable then the Federal Conservatives - despite the CAQ doing everything in their power to try to make their voters into federal Tories.

It honestly would be kinda funny if PP of all people is the one to win over these voters through I dunno...leveraging discontent and his identity maybe?

[DL]

It honestly would be kinda funny if PP of all people is the one to win over these voters through I dunno...leveraging discontent and his identity maybe?

PP may have a French sounding name - but he is anglo through and through. He is from Alberta and speaks OK French as a second language. There are plenty of people with more English sounding names than PP who speak much better French than he does

[mileslunn]

It honestly would be kinda funny if PP of all people is the one to win over these voters through I dunno...leveraging discontent and his identity maybe?

PP may have a French sounding name - but he is anglo through and through. He is from Alberta and speaks OK French as a second language. There are plenty of people with more English sounding names than PP who speak much better French than he does

I thought he was a Francophone.  His biological parents yes Anglophones but I thought his adopted parents were Francophones.  I don't believe though he has any French ancestry despite his name as Poilievre comes from his adopted parents not biological.

[MaxQue]

It honestly would be kinda funny if PP of all people is the one to win over these voters through I dunno...leveraging discontent and his identity maybe?

PP may have a French sounding name - but he is anglo through and through. He is from Alberta and speaks OK French as a second language. There are plenty of people with more English sounding names than PP who speak much better French than he does

I thought he was a Francophone.  His biological parents yes Anglophones but I thought his adopted parents were Francophones.  I don't believe though he has any French ancestry despite his name as Poilievre comes from his adopted parents not biological.

From hearing him, he has good French, but it sounds very learned and with mistakes, so people in Quebec won't think he is a Francophone.

[RogueBeaver]

https://twitter.com/globeandmail/status/1532761054895230976

Former Longueuil mayor Caroline St-Hilaire is another star sovereigntist recruit for Legault. Levesque did something similar in 1976 with high-profile Unionist recruits like Pierre-Marc Johnson, Jean-Guy Cardinal and Jean-Francois Bertrand.

[The Right Honourable Martin Brian Mulroney PC CC GOQ]

I don't know much about QC-poli, so maybe someone can clear this up for me:



Québec Solidaire clearly defines itself as sovereigntist party, but do they just not emphasize it like the PQ does? Is it a passive thing, like sovereignty is cool I guess, but we're happy to just have more rent control and government programs, or are they actually firm on the idea, but many of their federalist voters don't care because they just want to vote for a left-wing party?

[Oryxslayer]

I don't know much about QC-poli, so maybe someone can clear this up for me:


Québec Solidaire clearly defines itself as sovereigntist party, but do they just not emphasize it like the PQ does? Is it a passive thing, like sovereignty is cool I guess, but we're happy to just have more rent control and government programs, or are they actually firm on the idea, but many of their federalist voters don't care because they just want to vote for a left-wing party?

As you can tell by the topline, the sovereignty debate is dead and buried for about 10-15 years now depending upon how you measure it. What killed it was the changing of the guard inside the electorate, and younger (relative, now they are in their 30s and 40s) voters not seeing the point waging their parents losing struggle. This process continues with generational replacement producing an electorate that cares less and less about this issue.

QS defines itself as a sovereigntist party. It's a principle thing. But realistically, it is nowhere near their top issue. The same is true for their voters. Broadly speaking, QS wins university towns and urban centers, but still gets voters outside these cores. They are comparable to a provincial NDP. Like the NDP, they need not compromise their principles since they are not looking to build a electorate that can win power. Which is a shame, cause QS is essentially another post-sovereignty party for mainly but not exclusively Francophones like CAQ. Their electorate bridges their traditional divides because it is an electorate of voters who care about other issues. If they ever do wish to contest power though - which has fallen from the sovereigntist debating parties into the hands of the first post-sovereignty party that showed up - that plank will need to go.