Drama, intrigue and byelections
• Death, palace intrigue and allegations of lies and corruption are at the centre of the highest number of Quebec byelections in more than 30 years.
The Oct. 2 byelection in the Quebec City riding of Louis-Hebert will be the 15th in the province since Philippe Couillard’s Liberals formed a majority government in April 2014.
Ontario, by contrast, has had seven byelections since Kathleen Wynne’s Liberals won in June that year.
At roughly $500,000 a pop, byelections this legislative session will cost Quebec around $8 million, according to the province’s elections commission.
And that sum doesn’t include so-called “transition” allowances given to some of the departing politicians.
Before November 2015, members of the legislature who left mid-mandate were eligible to such payments to help them in their transition.
Yves Bolduc, the ex-education minister who lost Couillard’s confidence early in the Liberal mandate, pocketed $150,000. His staff shared another $150,000.
The high number of byelections — the most in one mandate since 1981-85 — forced the government to end the practice of automatic allowances. Now, only politicians who leave early for “serious” family or health reasons are eligible.
Julie Champagne, a spokeswoman for Quebec’s national assembly, said “it is up to the ethics commissioner to determine if the departing member satisfies the conditions to receive an allocation.”
Despite the change, nine members resigned this session before the new rules were adopted. The most high-profile resignation came in May 2016, roughly 24 hours after a cryptic television interview involving Julie Snyder, the ex-partner of then-Parti Québécois leader Pierre Karl Peladeau.
Peladeau resigned the following day, saying he was choosing his family over politics. He’d been leader for a year.
Weeks later, PQ house leader Bernard Drainville resigned and soon after began co-hosting a popular Quebec City radio show, leading pundits to speculate his political career was hitched to Peladeau’s and sank as a result of him leaving.
Drainville had replaced Stephane Bedard, who quit office shortly after Peladeau demoted him in 2015.
The Liberals haven’t had it any easier, with the Opposition strategically attacking the party on its key vulnerability: its past.
The Opposition has tried to pick off Liberal cabinet ministers by accusing them of corruption and being tied to alleged wrongdoings from the Liberal era of Jean Charest, whose party lost the 2012 general election.
Sam Hamad left cabinet in April 2016 after he was connected to a former Liberal fundraiser facing corruption-related criminal charges. The fundraiser, Marc Yvan Cote, is awaiting trial.
Hamad was cleared by the province’s ethics commissioner of any wrongdoing but quit politics last April.
Former cabinet minister Jacques Daoust resigned in 2016 after perceived wrongdoing involving the controversial sale of Rona Inc. to U.S. hardware retailer Lowe’s. He died last month.