THE CHALLENGE FOR THE LEFT

Quebec after the ‘orange wave’

by Jessica Squires

Everything political is new in Quebec these days: members of parliament, political prospects and the alignment of political forces.

There are 58 brand new NDP MPs in Quebec—more seats than the NDP has ever won in total in any single election across the whole country. Many of them are new to politics, and they have predictably been targeted by the mainstream media as too young, too inexperienced, too unpolished (read: working class).

But this group presents possibilities for both the social movements of Quebec and Canada, and for the federal NDP itself.

The reasons for the NDP’s gains in Quebec have been laid at the feet of the charismatic popularity of Jack Layton, and the Sherbrooke Declaration passed at their 2006 convention in Quebec City. The Sherbrooke Declaration does read as a clear denunciation of the federal Clarity Act, passed in 2000.

Under the Clarity Act, any referendum of Quebeckers about their relationship to the Canadian state would need to be approved after the fact. The House of Commons would have the power to decide whether a proposed referendum question was considered clear enough and won the support of a large enough majority.

Also, because secession would require an amendment to the Constitution, the referendum itself would not be binding—only subsequent negotiations could be.

As people in Quebec say, the Supreme Court is like the tower of Pisa: it always leans in the same direction. It’s not surprising that Quebeckers applauded the Sherbrooke Declaration given its statement that self-determination is a “political question and not a legal one.”

But unfortunately, the federal NDP has refused to withdraw its official support for the Clarity Act.
During his first election as leader in 2004, Layton stated he was opposed to it; he immediately had his wrist slapped by Alexa McDonough and Bill Blaikie in very public fashion. It’s something of a miracle that the NDP managed to recover from those events in only seven years.

But the story of the NDP’s Quebec rise is more complex than mere policy support for self-determination. Politics in Quebec have been realigning for over a decade.

The PQ’s fortunes have been foundering since their fatal move to an openly neoliberal position in 1996. When they did that, many who formerly supported the party tore up their membership cards in disgust. Many returned later, but the shift has been inexorable ever since.

Politics in Quebec is slowly lining up along progressive versus conservative lines, as opposed to strictly around the axis of sovereignty. Further, it has shown a tendency towards choosing the new over the traditional; the old parties being identified with corruption, empty promises and the gradual degradation of public services and daily life.

Thus, in 2007, the conservative ADQ party experienced unprecedented success (being catapulted into official opposition status in the National Assembly) as Quebeckers abandoned what they saw as old-style politics for a party that was neither the Liberals—who were under attack from social movements—nor the PQ—whose election promise of holding a referendum immediately upon election caused deep unease. The ADQ also capitalized on racist sentiment fanned by the media-fed debate over reasonable accommodation.

Québec solidaire

The left-wing Québec solidaire (QS) was only a year old during that election, so was not capable of taking full advantage of the destabilisation of the traditional parties.

The NDP election results in 2011 are part of this pattern. They also point to the huge potential for QS, which calls for the unity of the left as opposed to a cross-class coalition of independentists.

It is now poised to take advantage of the new terrain caused by both an ideological and consciousness shift among ordinary Quebeckers, and the gutting of Bloc Québécois resources that ordinarily would organically be connected to the PQ election machine. There is even some chance that the NDP’s activist base might become a source of support for QS in the next election.

One indication of how things have shifted is that in the days following the election, the QS office received multiple phone calls and e-mails from random individuals expressing their interest in joining the party or even being QS candidates in the next election.

Meanwhile, the political realignment continues on the right as well. The right-wing Coalition pour l’avenir du Quebec (Coalition for the Future of Quebec), led by former PQ cabinet minister Francois Legault, has garnered much attention. Legault’s group explicitly states the national question is not its concern.

Speculation of a merger with the ADQ is rampant. But Legault says he is neither forming a political party nor merging with ADQ. Significantly, PQ leader Pauline Marois has said she would welcome him back if he is still a sovereigntist. The ADQ has also made overtures.

During all of this, QS has been consistently polling between 8 and 12 per cent for months. The ADQ has also seen gains in the polls. But QS is the only party in Quebec that has grown in membership and in donations in the last year.

The 42 per cent of the vote the NDP got in Quebec came from a wide cross section of public opinion. A recent poll states that a third of them would vote “yes” if a referendum was held on sovereignty.

The presence in the new NDP caucus of a healthy handful of QS members, radical trade unionists and others of a sovereigntist slant will make things very interesting. This will force the NDP to take the issue of Québec self-determination more seriously than ever before. It even raises the spectre of possible future splits from the caucus—a possible Bloc Québec solidaire.

As we went to press, three prominent members of the Parti Québecois resigned in protest over a Bill, put forward by a PQ private member, that was designed to protect a Quebec City deal with Quebecor for a new arena from any judicial recourse. It was, they said, “la goute qui fait déborder le vase”—the last straw—in a pattern they could no longer live with, of “bipartisanship” and “politics as usual.” Their words sounded like a call to split from the old parties, and are part of the shift away from the old ways of power.

This shift is also reflected in the June 8 poll showing QS at an astounding 17 per cent, and the surge in their membership since the federal election.

However, the new landscape also means the potential for united pan-Canadian social movements against Harper is greater than it has been since the 1970s. Whether the NDP evolves into a party “of the ballot box and of the street” like QS or falls into a centrist “government in waiting” stance, the orientation taken, with a majority Québec MPs, will have an important impact on social movements and on the future of the relationship between Quebec and Canada.