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You say you want to channel the “complaint” to take it to Parliament, to give a voice to all the disaffected. If your party doesn’t elect an MP, what do you intend to do with this “grumpy” over the next four years?
Alexandre Lacoste
Eric Duhaime: First, grumbling is dissatisfaction and dissatisfaction. Your reader would do well to point this out. It is quite normal for an opposition party in a democracy to channel dissatisfaction and try to offer an alternative. Because of this, the Quebec Conservative Party has seen phenomenal growth over the past year. We are by far the party with the most members. If we don’t elect an MP, we submit to the democratic vote. We’re in a Quebec democracy, so we’ve always changed, with one vote in one ballot box. Therefore, instead of organizing demonstrations or doing anything else, we have decided to direct our energies into founding a political party. We are currently succeeding in bringing these ideas to the National Assembly. Many of us in Quebec over the last few years have felt that all four parties were speaking with one voice that there was a democratic deficit that we intend to fully rectify on October 3rd.
Contrasting with the other four parties, what would you have suggested regarding the pandemic to protect life and reduce contagion? Don’t you agree that when the lives of others or even our own lives are in danger, our freedom is restricted?
Eric Gauthier
Eric Duhaime: Yes, but there are several elements. We would have protected the most vulnerable, which Quebec hasn’t necessarily always done well, by moving people between hospitals and dormitories [de personnes âgées] and CHSLDs. We would have separated public health from politics. As in many others [États], had Public Health held its press conferences separately, would have made public recommendations to the government. The role of elected officials is to represent all interests of Quebec society. Public health does not take into account the number of bankruptcies or the number of young people who will have problems dropping out of school. It was the role of politicians to weigh the pros and cons and explain why they follow certain public health recommendations and why they don’t follow others.
In your financial framework, you remove support for companies in the first three years of a first mandate. According to Investissement Québec’s annual report, 4,607 companies received support last year. How many companies do you think would have to close without government involvement?
Michel Simard, Quebec
Eric Duhaime: We have no way of knowing what the impact would be, just as we have no way of knowing how many companies would have survived had they not been overwhelmed. These companies might have created more jobs, improved their technology, improved their productivity, exported. We can’t measure it.
What is the greatest achievement Quebec has advanced?
Colette Fecteau, Saint Severin, Beauce Centre
Eric Duhaime: Quebec is one of the most tolerant and open societies. I’m very proud of that. I had the opportunity to live abroad and our society is very open to differences. The proof is that it is no coincidence that I am the first gay leader in the history of conservative parties in Canada.
If you had only one reason, which one would you choose?
Josee Massicotte
Eric Duhaime: Right now, the main thing is to make our healthcare system more efficient. The reform we are proposing is the most ambitious and also the most urgent.
Do you accept the conclusions of the IPCC reports, in particular that climate change is responsible for extreme weather episodes, that climate change is caused by human activities and that it is necessary to significantly reduce the consumption of hydrocarbons in order to curb global warming?
Guillaume Leclerc
Eric Duhaime: As a matter of fact. In the PCQ voting platform, we acknowledge the existence of global warming. That is why we offer solutions, especially with regard to the electrification of transport.
Interview by Vincent Brousseau Pouliot
Note: Some of the questions and answers have been shortened for reasons of clarity.
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