‘We’re heading to A victory,’ Lisée says
Confident PQ leader suggests party right on track to unseat Liberals
Jean-François Lisée delivered a rousing speech to campaign volunteers in his Rosemont riding.
Minutes later, he posed for a photo opportunity outside holding a baby. Then he walked a block and kibitzed with a group of about 30 people at a local public seniors home.
“You guys know that I’m here often, not just during the election,” Lisée said, before cracking a few jokes and taking questions.
In all, Lisée spent half the day Thursday in his home riding at four different events. It was the fourth time the PQ leader has visited Rosemont since the campaign began two weeks ago, but is that a sign that he and the Parti Québécois organization are worried their leader could lose his seat on Oct. 1?
Lisée insisted he’s comfortable that he’ll win in the riding that has been in the hands of the PQ since 1994.
“I don’t see how it’s tight,” he said, adding that the party’s internal polls have suggested he has a 10-point lead in the riding. “I love Rosemont. I have a great connection with the people here. I want to keep representing the people here and I am very confident they will want to renew their vows on Oct. 1.”
Inside Lisée’s riding office, organizers admitted Thursday to feeling the heat from Québec solidaire, who are running star candidate Vincent Marissal — a former La Presse columnist — and are poised to gain ground in the eastern part of Montreal.
“We’re definitely feeling the pressure from Québec solidaire, but I feel we are going to win this,” said Donald Laplante, a volunteer who has gone door-to-door during this election and several past elections for the PQ. “We have confidence.”
However, some polls have projected a tight race for Lisée and vice-leader Véronique Hivon in their own ridings. On Thursday, Le Soleil reported on a Mainstreet Poll that found Hivon was trailing CAQ candidate François St-Louis in popular support in the riding.
Lisée cautioned about relying too much on polls, saying seat projections from pollsters have varied wildly in recent weeks. He said the tendency he has seen in all the polls and through his work in the campaign suggests his party is gaining in popularity and is on track to unseat the Liberals and form a majority government.
“We’re heading to a victory,” he said.
Lisée said proof of the PQ’s momentum appears to be a statement of panic made by Coalition Avenir Québec Leader François Legault, who urged traditional PQ voters on Thursday to abandon the party and vote for the CAQ as the only way to defeat the Liberals.
“I didn’t think M. Legault would be panicking this early in the campaign,” Lisée said. “People are figuring out that the PQ is the only real party of change.”
Lisée even reached out to the English-speaking community Thursday, saying he will keep the anglophone secretariat established by the Liberals and dedicate a minister to the community.
“We need a real voice for our most minority community in Quebec,” said Lisée, who served as minister responsible for the English-speaking community when he was part of Pauline Marois’s minority PQ government.
Earlier in the day, Lisée pledged to ensure more local food will be on the menu of public schools and nursing homes across the province, as part of the party ’s platform to support the province’s farmers.
Lisée said if his party forms the government after the Oct. 1 election, it would oblige all public institutions that serve food, like nursing homes, public schools and hospitals, to ensure their meals are made with at least 50 per cent of their ingredients from Quebecbased producers.
Lisée visited a farmhouse and restaurant in St-Charles-surRichelieu, and the head office of the Union des producteurs agricoles in Longueuil and said part of the problem affecting the agricultural sector is that it is not financially feasible for young people to get into farming because of the high price of land.
“Buying a farm right now is like buying a one-way ticket to bankruptcy,” Lisée said.
He pledged to make it easier for farmers to qualify for a state-sponsored program that helps finance land purchases. He also pledged more tax credits for farmers and the creation of a department to recruit and handle travel logistics for foreign temporary workers engaged as farmhands during the harvest.
When asked, Lisée said he did not know how much more it would cost schools, hospitals and other public institutions to go with menus that had 50 per cent local ingredients. He also did not know what percentage of Quebec ingredients currently make up the menus of such institutions. However, he said the program could pay for itself because it will result in more revenue for local farmers, and therefore more income tax paid to the province.