| Quebec Liberal Party Parti Libéral du Québec |
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|---|---|
| Leader | Jean Charest |
| President | Marc Tanguay |
| Founded | July 1, 1867 |
| Headquarters | 7240 Rue Waverly, Montreal, Quebec, H2R 2Y8 1535 Chemin Sainte-Foy, suite 120, Quebec City, Quebec, G1S 2P1 |
| Ideology | Quebec federalism, Quebec nationalism, Neoliberalism, Social liberalism |
| Official colours | Red, Blue (Unofficial) |
| Seats in the National Assembly |
65 / 125
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| Website | |
| www.plq.org/en/index.php | |
| Politics of Quebec Political parties Elections |
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The Quebec Liberal Party (French: Parti Libéral du Québec, PLQ) is a centre-right[1] political party in Quebec. It has been independent of the federal Liberal Party of Canada since 1955.
The party has traditionally supported Quebec federalism: i.e., in favour of Quebec remaining within Canada, and operating within Canadian federalism. The party also supports a role for government in the economy, although in recent years its economic policies have moved towards neoliberalism. It remains, however, a socially liberal party.
The Quebec Liberals have always been associated with the colour red; each of their three main opponents in different eras have been associated with the colour blue. In 2007, however, the Action démocratique du Québec (ADQ), whose official colours are blue and red, temporarily became the official opposition in the National Assembly of Quebec.
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The Liberal Party is descended from:
The most notable figure of this period was Louis-Joseph Papineau.
The Liberals were in opposition to the ruling Conservatives for most of the first 20 years after Canadian Confederation, except for 18 months of Liberal minority government in 1878-1879. However, the situation changed in 1885 when the federal Conservative government executed Louis Riel, the leader of the French-speaking Métis people of western Canada. This decision was unpopular in Quebec. Honoré Mercier rode this wave of discontent to power in 1887, but was brought down by a scandal in 1891. He was later cleared of all charges. The Conservatives returned to power until 1897.
The Liberals won the 1897 election, and held power without interruption for the next 39 years; the Conservatives never held power in Québec again. This mirrored the situation in Ottawa, where the arrival of Wilfrid Laurier in the 1896 federal election marked the beginning of Liberal Party of Canada dominance at the federal level. Notable long-serving Premiers of Quebec in this era were Lomer Gouin and Louis-Alexandre Taschereau.
By 1935, however, the Conservatives had an ambitious new leader, Maurice Duplessis. Duplessis merged his party with dissident ex-Liberals who had formed the Action libérale nationale. Duplessis led the new party, the Union Nationale (UN), to power in the 1936 election. The Liberals returned to power in the 1939 election, but lost it again in the 1944 election. They remained in opposition to the Union Nationale until one year after Duplessis's death in 1959.
In 1955, the PLQ severed its affiliation with the Liberal Party of Canada, and, at times since then, relations between the two parties have been strained.
Under Jean Lesage, the party won an historic election in 1960, ending sixteen years of rule by the conservative Union Nationale. This marked the beginning of the Quiet Revolution, which dramatically changed Québec society. Under the slogan maîtres chez nous (masters in our own house), the Quebec government undertook several major initiatives, including:
Under Lesage, the Liberals developed a Quebec nationalist wing. Some Liberals, including senior Cabinet minister René Lévesque, left the Liberals to join the sovereignty movement, participating in the founding of the Parti Québécois under Lévesque's leadership.
Relations soured between the Quebec Liberal Party and the federal Liberal Party under Lesage, and particularly under Robert Bourassa.
First elected in 1970, Robert Bourassa instituted Bill 22 to introduce French language as the official language in Quebec, and pushed Canadian Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau for constitutional concessions. Reelected in 1973, his government was also embarrassed by several scandals. Bourassa resigned from the party's leadership after the loss of the 1976 election to René Lévesque's Parti Québécois.
Bourassa was succeeded as Liberal leader by Claude Ryan, the former director of the respected Montréal newspaper, Le Devoir. Ryan led the successful federalist campaign in the 1980 Quebec referendum on Québec sovereignty, but then lost the 1981 election. He resigned as Liberal leader some time later, paving the way for the return of Robert Bourassa.
When Bourassa returned as Premier in 1985, he successfully persuaded the federal Progressive Conservative government of Brian Mulroney to recognize Quebec as a distinct society, and sought greater powers for Quebec and the other provinces. This resulted in the Meech Lake and Charlottetown constitutional accords. Both of these proposals, however, were not ratified. While a Quebec nationalist, Bourassa remained an opponent of independence for Quebec.
Daniel Johnson, Jr. succeeded Bourassa as Liberal leader and Premier of Québec in 1994, but soon lost the 1994 election to the Parti Québécois under Jacques Parizeau.
In 1993, after the failure of the Charlottetown Accord, many nationalist members of the Liberal party led by Jean Allaire and Mario Dumont, including many from the party's youth wing, left to form the Action démocratique du Québec (ADQ) because the Liberal Party dropped most of its autonomist demands during the negotiation of the Charlottetown Accord. As in 1980, the PLQ campaigned successfully for a "no" vote in the 1995 Quebec referendum on sovereignty.
The contemporary Québec Liberal Party is a broad-based coalition including among its members supporters of the federal Liberals, some federal Conservatives (who otherwise tend to support the Action démocratique du Québec (ADQ) in Québec politics), and some supporters of the federal New Democratic Party . In terms of voter support, it has always been able to rely on the great majority of non-francophones in Québec. [2]
Since the April 14, 2003 election, the Liberals have formed the government of Québec under Premier Jean Charest. Charest is a former federal Progressive Conservative cabinet minister. The current Liberal government has proposed a policy of reform of social programs and cuts to government spending and the civil service. In its most recent budget, the Liberal government established a controversial health system fee for all taxpayers.
It has also attenuated some long-standing protectionist role of the Québec government with regards to the French language. For example, in response to a Supreme Court of Canada decision overruling a loophole-closing stopgap measure enacted by the Bernard Landry government, the Liberals enacted Loi 104 which provides for English-language, unsubsidized private school students to transfer into the subsidized English-language system, thus receiving the right to attend English schools in Québec for their siblings and all descendants, should the student demonstrate a bureaucratically-defined parcours authentique within the English system. Meanwhile, the Office québécois de la langue française under the Liberal government has also opted for a demand-side strategy for the enforcement of language laws, using a number of publicity campaigns, including stickers which merchants may voluntarily affix on their shop windows stating that French service may be obtained within, allowing for consumers to "choose" stores which will serve them in French.
Midway through its first mandate, polls indicated the Charest government had been riding on the highest dissatisfaction rates ever recorded for a government in place in Québec. Highly controversial proposals to reform education, labour and social policy, stalled attempts to "streamline" the provincial civil service, growing labour unrest, and other factors gave the Parti Québécois a chance to win the 2007 election. After the elections the Liberals were forced to form a minority government, having lost francophone support to the ADQ.[3]
Charest, in his speech at the beginning of the most recent legislative assembly in May, criticized newcomers on their responsibility to Québec and indicated francophones want preservation against minority groups. To firm up party support, Charest empowered a task force which asked for more policies to strengthen the French language. Party delegates were as a majority dismissive of this, calling it not sufficiently federalist. Minorities, usually unconditionally federalist, were upset that Quebecers are being split between "us" and "them."[3]
Premier Charest called an early election for December 2008, and succeeded in winning enough additional seats in the National Assembly (increasing from 48 to 66 of 125 seats) to form a majority government. Election turnout was the lowest in Québec since the révolution tranquille.
Since its most recent election the Liberal government has been embroiled in a variety of scandals, including historic losses at the Caisse de dépôt et placement du Québec (this in spite of their 2008 campaign slogan, "L'économie d'abord" (The Economy First), and their assurances during the campaign that all was well with the investment fund), the attribution of highly-sought subsidized daycare spaces to Liberal Party donors, as well as allegations of systemic construction industry corruption which arose notably during the 2009 Montréal municipal election. Despite calls for a public commission of inquiry, the Charest government has refused to address the issue. Instead, a police operation dubbed Escouade Marteau was instituted to investigate allegations of corruption. This has not silenced government critics and the government currently enjoys historic lows in approval rating. Meanwhile, non-francophones remain enthusiastic supporters.[4]
In opinion polling since the 2008 election, support for the party has rapidly dissolved to other parties (falling to a low of 23% compared to 41% on voting day). Initially, the PQ was the party with the most gains, polling consistently in the high 30's to low 40's, but their support levels have gone back to the 2008 results level.
Since the collapse of the Bloc Québécois on the federal stage and the surge in the Quebec left-wing vote, Quebec Solidaire has risen to a consistent 10% (at one point even overtaking the ADQ at 17%), taking some support from Charest and also the PQ. Support for the ADQ has stabilised after a leadership power vacuum in 2009, recoving from 6% to 18%, taking a considerable amount of Liberal support in the Capitale-Nationale region. The PLQ is still doing well in the Montreal area, however.
The Québec Liberal Party has faced various opposing parties in its history. Its main opposition from the time of Confederation (1867) to the 1930s was the Parti conservateur du Québec. That party's successor, the Union Nationale, was the main opposition to the Liberals until the 1970s. Since then the Liberals have alternated in power with the Parti Québécois, a Quebec sovereigntist, self-described social-democratic party.
| General election | # of candidates | # of seats won | % of popular vote |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1867 | 40 | 12 | 39.8% |
| 1871 | 38 | 19 | 40.5% |
| 1875 | 46 | 19 | 40.5% |
| 1878 | 59 | 31 | 29.7% |
| 1881 | 46 | 14 | 39.4% |
| 1886 | 49 | 33 | 39.5% |
| 1890 | 68 | 43 | 46.4% |
| 1892 | 62 | 21 | 44.2% |
| 1897 | 78 | 51 | 54.6% |
| 1900 | 77 | 67 | 54.8% |
| 1904 | 87 | 68 | 65.7% |
| 1908 | 76 | 57 | 54.2% |
| 1912 | 83 | 62 | 53.5% |
| 1916 | 85 | 75 | 64.0% |
| 1919 | 99 | 74 | 65.4% |
| 1923 | 92 | 63 | 52.9% |
| 1927 | 86 | 75 | 60.3% |
| 1931 | 90 | 79 | 54.9% |
| 1935 | 91 | 48 | 46.8% |
| 1936 | 89 | 14 | 40.0% |
| 1939 | 87 | 70 | 54.1% |
| 1944 | 91 | 37 | 39.4% |
| 1948 | 93 | 8 | 36.2% |
| 1952 | 92 | 23 | 45.8% |
| 1956 | 93 | 20 | 44.9% |
| 1960 | 95 | 51 | 51.3% |
| 1962 | 97 | 63 | 56.40% |
| 1966 | 108 | 50 | 47.29% |
| 1970 | 108 | 72 | 45.40% |
| 1973 | 110 | 102 | 54.65% |
| 1976 | 110 | 26 | 33.77% |
| 1981 | 122 | 42 | 46.07% |
| 1985 | 122 | 99 | 55.99% |
| 1989 | 125 | 92 | 49.95% |
| 1994 | 125 | 47 | 44.40% |
| 1998 | 125 | 48 | 43.55% |
| 2003 | 125 | 76 | 45.99% |
| 2007 | 125 | 48 | 33.07% |
| 2008 | 125 | 66 | 42.06% |
One of the particularities of the Quebec Liberal Party is its Youth Commission. This standing committee is responsible for youth involvement in the party and has the office of members 16 to 25 years. This is the most powerful youth wing within his political party and what in the world with a minimum of one thirds of the delegates secured, the Congress of Members QLP (the supreme decision of the party). One of its bodies, the conference allows young people from across Quebec to spend a late week of debate on the political orientations of the CJ (Commission-Jeunesse in french). Every summer over thousand young Liberals meet for this congress. The Youth Commission has a number of QLP's struggles history both inside and outside his party. It marked the Quebec by proposing the creation Sun Card, fighting against Claude Ryan the 80 against the thawing of tuition and by requiring that QST is no longer collected on the sale Book Quebec in particular. In the 1980s, annual meetings of the Youth Commission drew near 1500 people year after year. She knew less pleasant moments, including during the deposition of Allaire report, which caused a tear within the Liberal Party and an exodus of members, leading to the creation of the ADQ (Action Démocratique du Québec). Chairman of the Youth Commission at the time was Mario Dumont, leader ADQ's 1994 to 2008. Among the debates led by young liberals note Teaching English in the first year of primary, the introduction of the Medicare card, abolition of junk food in schools, maintaining financing plan loans and scholarships, and Generations Fund.
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