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The election of the CAQ is widely portrayed in Anglo-Canada as a swing to right-wing, populist borderline Trumpian politics but this is almost solely based on their position on banning religious symbols for public employees in positions of authority. And that they've also said they'd reduce immigration by 20% and have immigrants pass a French test and a values test after being here for three years.
Anyway, in Canada these days it's almost as if your human worth and valour were totally dependent on how open you are to the growing presence of foreign and immigrant cultures and religions, especially Islam. Anything that remotely touches upon this stuff is viewed as highly suspicious.
It's worth noting that the so-called right-wing CAQ recently named their Cabinet (their Ministers) and they had a decidedly Trudeau-esque 50-50 balance between men and women.
Anyway, some stuff from the CAQ program:
- modest tax cuts for the middle class
- a greater openness to the private sector offering certain specific health care services (currently only offered by the public system)
- getting rid of the first-past-the-post electoral system and adopting a mixed proportional electoral system
- increasing public funding for Quebec's extensive preschool daycare system, and capping or rolling back the (comparatively nominal) fees parents have to pay
- expanding the public school system to bring in free junior kindergarten at age 4 across the province
- increasing funding for in vitro fertilization
- cracking down the common practice of hospitals forcing nurses to do overtime
- increasing salaries for nurses and public school teachers
- strengthening the laws that protect agricultural lands to curb urban sprawl
- wresting away some powers from Ottawa in important areas for Quebec like culture
What is the agenda of the new party governing Quebec. Who are its core supporters? People from around Montreal?
Traditionally the CAQ's support was in the Quebec City region and the rural areas around it. With a bit of a presence in the outer suburbs of Montreal.
This recent election marked a breakthrough in many other regions of Quebec. The CAQ was fairly dominant in most regions of the province, and even made a modest breakthrough on the island of Montreal itself by winning a couple of seats, something that few people thought possible.
The CAQ also won three of five seats in my region of the Outaouais which along with the westernmost parts of Montreal are the biggest traditional Liberal bastions in the province.
We have ridings here that had been solidly Liberal for 40-50 years or more.
(My own member of the National Assembly is now from the CAQ.)
- modest tax cuts for the middle class
- a greater openness to the private sector offering certain specific health care services (currently only offered by the public system)
- getting rid of the first-past-the-post electoral system and adopting a mixed proportional electoral system
- increasing public funding for Quebec's extensive preschool daycare system, and capping or rolling back the (comparatively nominal) fees parents have to pay
- expanding the public school system to bring in free junior kindergarten at age 4 across the province
- increasing funding for in vitro fertilization
- cracking down the common practice of hospitals forcing nurses to do overtime
- increasing salaries for nurses and public school teachers
- strengthening the laws that protect agricultural lands to curb urban sprawl
- wresting away some powers from Ottawa in important areas for Quebec like culture
At its ideological core, the CAQ also has a strong "small government" theme which got them perceived as right-wing in the first place (other than immigration/identity) and got them their first MPs as the ADQ and then the CAQ. That was more apparent in the 2014 elections but the PLQ won and ended up implementing much of the CAQ's platform. Given the backlash against "austerity", the CAQ made sure not to put too much of an emphasis on fiscal conservatism in their 2018 platform, but they still hold the approach that many of the new spending they project will only be made possible through cuts in "the machine" a.k.a. public servants who do not directly provide services to the population.
At its ideological core, the CAQ also has a strong "small government" theme which got them perceived as right-wing in the first place (other than immigration/identity) and got them their first MPs as the ADQ and then the CAQ. That was more apparent in the 2014 elections but the PLQ won and ended up implementing much of the CAQ's platform. Given the backlash against "austerity", the CAQ made sure not to put too much of an emphasis on fiscal conservatism in their 2018 platform, but they still hold the approach that many of the new spending they project will only be made possible through cuts in "the machine" a.k.a. public servants who do not directly provide services to the population.
These are good reminders.
Though we're moving more in that direction, Quebec still doesn't really have a left-right political divide like you see elsewhere. Yet.
For example, even though the PQ tends to be seen as on the left and social democratic, they made lots of cuts to government services and employees when Lucien Bouchard was Premier under their party.
My sense is that things won't be too painful under the CAQ as long as the economic numbers stay good.
About a year or two ago, Lowe's took over Quebec hardware giant Rona. The governing Liberals let the deal go through. Yesterday Lowe's announced the closure of a number of stores in Canada, including several in Quebec.
It reminded me that back then the CAQ criticized the Liberals for not doing anything to keep Rona in Quebec hands. Now that the CAQ is in power, there is nothing they can do about this but yesterday Legault pledged to do his darndest to not let this happen to any other biggies of corporate Quebec, and keep them in our hands.
This kind of state intervention in the free market economy does not strike me as right wing...
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