Election campaign is underway

Elections will be held in Quebec on April 14 after a long, five-year PQ mandate. Last summer, after four byelections in June, the future was grim for the PQ and its leader, Bernard Landry. They lost two strongholds in the "Quebec profond" (rural Quebec) and the middle-class French Canadian riding of Laval. The Action Democratique du Quebec, with its young leader Mario Dumont, won three seats with a comfortable majority. The Liberal Party of Quebec lost everywhere and its leader Jean Charest was in a terribly depressed mood. After that ADQ victory, polls showed that the ADQ would have easily won general elections in the summer, despite its weak organization and its controversial program.

The ADQ program resembles the "Common Sense Revolution " of Mike Harris, but with more audacity. It includes a flat tax, school vouchers, daycare vouchers, less bureaucracy, involvement of the private sector in solving the crisis in the health care system and the rapid payment of provincial debts. In the last few months, the weakness of ADQ preparation has given the impression that the young party has renounced some parts of its original program. This has been bad for its image. The revolution was difficult to sell to traditionally social democratic Quebecers. It is a completely new approach after 40 years of the Quiet and socialist Revolution. Even if the people of Quebec are tired of the PQ and its obsession with separatist referenda, the fear of the ADQ revolution seems to dominate public opinion.

The lastest polls clearly show that the PQ is ahead and the ADQ is back to a third-place position, behind the Liberal party. A poll on Feb. 15 put the PQ and the ADQ in first place with 34 per cent of support, after a long period of domination by the ADQ. On March 6, the ADQ was third with 25 per cent, whereas the PQ and the PLQ were first with 36 per cent. We must realize, however, that with such a result, the PQ would win a majority of the seats because the PLQ support is concentrated among the English and ethnic ridings in the Montreal area. In the general elections of 1998, the PLQ got more votes than the PQ, but had less seats. The most recent polls that came out when the election campaigns were launched on March 13 show that the PQ started with a good lead: 38 per cent. The PLQ received 29 per cent and the ADQ just 21 per cent. It was a complete collapse for the ADQ. Last June, sociologist and poll analyst Pierre Drouilly predicted the eradication of the PQ, but now predicts an easy majority for the PQ as the next government, and just one seat for the ADQ in Riviere-du-Loup, Mario Dumont's stronghold.

Much hope had been placed on Mario Dumont. His electoral victory would have been a new era in the history of Quebec. The young generation, tired of the irresponsibility of the baby-boomers, would have finally taken its place. It seems that we will have to wait another five years. Perhaps is it not so bad, because it is true that Dumont's team is quite weak and its program is not solid. An ADQ government could have been a disaster. The union leaders have attacked the ADQ very directly and violently because it promotes more flexibility and responsibility, less privileges and less bureaucracy. It seems that the alliance between the PQ and unions will win again in defending the socialist "modele quebecois," but it will be their last victory.

Questions about family will be raised during the campaign. Bernard Landry promised young parents that they would be able to request a four-day week from their employers. Instead of that, Mario Dumont proposed daycare vouchers for parents who do not necessarily want to send their young children to public daycare. Again, Dumont promotes liberty, even for traditional families in which the mother can stay at home to take care of her children, whereas Landry wants to impose a "modern" concept of the family in which both parents work in the city. The most pro-life and pro-family party, however, is the new Democratie Chretienne du Quebec, led by engineer Gilles Noel, a very strong pro-lifer. The party is formally against abortion - it would defund it in Quebec and would abolish the homosexual civil unions approved last June under the PQ government. Unfortunately, the party is not ready for the elections, but will nevertheless present more than 20 candidates in the next elections.