LegAult heAds to regions
GATINEAU Saying he expects to make big breakthroughs across the province, Coalition Avenir Québec Leader François Legault changed course on Sunday, cancelling visits to Trois-Rivières and Quebec City and taking his campaign toward ridings that have never been won by his party.
Legault now plans to head to Chibougamau before visiting Val-d’Or, Amos, Saguenay–LacSt-Jean, the Côte-Nord and BasSt-Laurent.
In most, if not all, of the ridings he plans to visit over the next few days, the CAQ came third in 2014.
For the most part, the party’s support has been clustered in the outer-ring suburbs of Montreal, near Quebec City and along the St. Lawrence between the two cities.
Sunday was the second day in a row that Legault visited Gatineau. On Saturday, he visited victims of Friday evening’s tornado and spoke to reporters accompanied by Québec solidaire co-spokesperson Manon Massé, who had also come to show her support.
That visit had a less political tone, with the rivals putting their differences aside to talk about supporting the people of Gatineau and the need to fight climate change, which both Legault and Massé say is the underlying cause of the extreme weather events — including torrential rain and flooding — that have affected Gatineau in the past 16 months.
On Sunday, though, Legault was back to campaigning, calling for parents of young children to vote early. His sales pitch was based on the CAQ’s plan to increase family allowance payments to $2,400 per child under 18.
“Please go and vote to get this $2,400 per child,” he said.
Legault defended the decision to increase family allowances instead of cutting taxes.
“What’s the difference? When you give $2,400 per child, what’s the difference between that and a tax cut?” he said.
Asked about the people who don’t have children under 18 — whose taxes will fund the handouts for families — Legault said they’ll have to be satisfied with a cut to the school tax.
For several days, Legault has said his promise to cut school taxes is intended to help seniors, whose pensions have not risen along with increases in the school tax rate.
However, when asked on Sunday why he had not proposed a measure to specifically support seniors, but instead proposed cutting a tax paid on all commercial and residential properties in Quebec, Legault gave a different answer.
“I think right now it’s not fair. It’s a question of equity also — some people pay 30 cents per $100 of evaluation and some pay 10 cents. It’s not fair,” he said.
School taxes are based on property values, and while the Liberal government standardized rates between school boards in the same region, the rates can vary dramatically between regions. Legault wants to reduce all school taxes in the province to $0.1054 per $100 of assessed value — the lowest rate in the province. In Montreal, the current rate is $0.17832 per $100 of assessed value.
The cut would be phased in over four years, and the CAQ estimates it would cost the government $700 million in the fourth year.
On Sunday Legault also promised to expand Highway 50, which connects the Montreal region to Gatineau, to four lanes. The highway is mostly a two-lane route, which Legault said is dangerous.
There was no specific cost associated with the promise.
Legault, who wants to extend several other highways, said the Ministry of Transport needs to change the way it solicits bids for contracts, taking steps to ensure there are more bidders.
More bids are “the best way to get more for your money,” Legault said. “It’s certain that in (the Ministry of ) Transport there are problems with corruption, but there are also still problems with management, problems of efficiency.”
Cleaning up those problems starts at the top, he said.
If the CAQ is elected, Legault said, the new government would review the qualifications of deputy ministers.
“It’s certain that people, senior bureaucrats, who don’t have the training or the experience to take on important duties and manage large budgets, we will replace them.”