The 2021 candidates with TVA debate moderator Pierre Bruneau/Pool photo

Daniel Béland

September 3, 2021

The battle to win the hearts and minds of Quebec voters remains a focus of federal parties during this short federal campaign. Because francophone Quebec voters have a reputation for unpredictability, the last two weeks of the campaign are likely to be particularly interesting in La Belle Province, where Quebec premier François Legault remains a force federal leaders must reckon with. Legault’s role as a factor in the Quebec campaign was apparent in the TVA debate Thursday night, where his presence hovered like an invisible fifth player, especially during exchanges on secularism and federal health care transfers.

In contrast to his counterparts — Doug Ford in Ontario, Jason Kenney in Alberta, and Brian Pallister in Manitoba — premier Legault has not witnessed a steep decline in popularity in the polls in the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic. On the contrary, according to a June Angus Reid poll, Legault remains the most popular premier in the country, with a 66 percent approval rating. Considering Premier Legault’s enduring popularity, his shadow looms over the current federal campaign in Quebec as it did in 2019. This is the case in part because Coalition Avenir Québéc (CAQ) supporters, who are overwhelmingly francophone, are a major target for the three strongest federal parties in Quebec right now: the Bloc Québécois, the Liberal Party of Canada (LPC), and the Conservative Party of Canada (CPC). Because the NDP trails at below 15 percent in the polls (with only one seat left in the province, which it hopes to keep), it is no longer a strong contender in Quebec. Clearly, the main battle is between the LPC, which remains ahead in the polls and the Bloc, which is well ahead of the CPC, a party that won only 10 seats out of 78 back in 2019, compared to 35 for the LPC and 32 for the Bloc.

On the very first day of the campaign, Bloc leader Yves François Blanchet stated the objective of his party this year was to win 40 seats in total. So far in the campaign, however, the momentum that the Bloc would need to reach that objective seems to be somewhat lacking. This is the case in part because, in contrast to what happened during the 2019 campaign, the ever-influential premier Legault has not strongly criticized the prime minister. Last time around, the fact that Legault openly attacked Trudeau for his seemingly ambiguous stance on Quebec’s Bill 21 on secularism provided powerful ammunition to Blanchet, who claimed to be the only one able to protect Quebec identity, something reflected in the 2019 electoral slogan of the party: “Le Québec c’est nous”.

The claim that the Bloc will remain an opposition party and that Quebeckers must be well represented at the decision table — a classic argument of both the Conservatives and the Liberals in Quebec — is predictably resurfacing.

While the debate on secularism helped the Bloc two years ago, this time around, this issue is no longer front and centre of the political agenda, despite attempts by Blanchet to revive it, which have so far proved rather unsuccessful, even if the issue was raised briefly during the TVA debate (Face à face 2021). Before the campaign, in the context of federal spending announcements in the province, Legault and Trudeau appeared to have a very good relationship and some commentators and journalists even alluded to a potential “bromance” between the two. Although this could be nothing more than a marriage of convenience, this time around, beyond vague remarks about the fact that the LPC (like the NDP) had a more centralizing agenda, the premier of Quebec has not said much that could help the Bloc get closer to Blanchet’s stated objective of 40 seats in the province. This is excellent news for the Liberals, who must hope they can avoid more direct criticisms from Legault for the remainder of the campaign. For them, the fact that Quebec identity and the related theme of secularism are less central in this campaign than in 2019 is a blessing, but will it last until the end of it?

The Conservatives, like the Liberals, seek to challenge the Bloc’s claim that they are the only possible strong voice for Quebecers in Ottawa. Now that the Conservatives are ahead in the polls in Canada as a whole, Conservative leader Erin O’Toole can also claim that he is the only viable alternative to Trudeau, a claim that has the merit of being true. Recently, when Legault said the NDP and the Liberals had a more centralizing agenda, some commentators in Quebec saw it as an implicit endorsement of O’Toole rather than Blanchet, who cannot become prime minister. The claim that the Bloc will remain an opposition party and that Quebeckers must be well represented at the decision table — a classic argument of both the Conservatives and the Liberals in Quebec — is predictably resurfacing as the race between the two parties becomes much tighter across the country and that the Conservatives now have the momentum.

In contrast to 2019, when Blanchet made an excellent first impression with francophone viewers and then-CPC leader Andrew Scheer faced tough questions about his stance on abortion, the 2021 TVA debate seems unlikely to alter the race, in Quebec and elsewhere in the country. Although Trudeau faced strong attacks from the other leaders, which was expected considering he is the prime minister, he was quite combative and showed he still had fire in his belly. The same applies to Blanchet, who generally does well in French-language debates, especially this one, which was centred on Quebec and where, in contrast to the other leaders on the stage, he did not have to anticipate the reactions of voters from outside the province when he spoke. As for O’Toole and Singh, although they both struggled at times, they did not make major mistakes that could hurt their party in other provinces, which is where they hope to make major gains come September 20. In Quebec, the battle for votes will remain mainly a contest between the Bloc and the LPC, in the shadow of a very popular premier.

Daniel Béland is director of the McGill Institute for the Study of Canada and James McGill Professor of Political Science at McGill University. He thanks André Lecours and Lisa Van Dusen for their comments and suggestions.