Session Recap: What Caught Our Attention

September

Back to School: Teachers Are Absent

On the eve of the 2023 school year, headlines announced that more than 8,500 teachers were missing from Quebec classrooms, according to figures from school service centres. It was only afterward that these figures were found to be incorrect and dated from August. The incident highlighted another issue: the poor management of education data.

Network stakeholders point to oversized class ratios, an increasing number of students with special needs, and a decline in teaching quality due to a lack of support. In the eye of the storm, Education Minister Bernard Drainville admitted that the immediate objective was not necessarily to have a teacher in every classroom, but at least one adult. By October, still according to estimates from school service centres, more than 1,600 positions remained unfilled.

September

Cell Phones in Class: New Pedagogical Priority?

A major change in students’ reality: cell phones will officially be banned in classrooms as of December 31, 2023. Minister Drainville made the call by sending school service centres a directive to that effect. The measure aims to create an environment more conducive to teaching and learning, with the goal of promoting student success. Some argue that cell phones can be used constructively for educational purposes, while others are pleased to be rid of this source of distraction.

September

The Tribute That Embarrassed Canada

During a highly anticipated visit by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to Ottawa, parliamentarians had the opportunity to pay tribute to several heroes of Ukrainian origin. Among them, a former Ukrainian soldier who had fought during the Second World War, on the Nazi side.

After the affair made headlines around the world and under unbearable pressure from the opposition, the media, and the Liberal government itself, the Speaker of the House of Commons, Anthony Rota, was forced to resign in disgrace and was replaced by Greg Fergus. At the National Assembly, members unanimously passed a motion to dissociate themselves from the embarrassing tribute.

October

A Fourth Musketeer at the National Assembly

The beginning of October was marked by a surprising PQ victory in Jean-Talon, a Quebec City riding left vacant by the departure of CAQ member Joëlle Boutin in July. Surprising given the riding’s composition, which had never been won by that party in its entire history, in a region where the PQ has struggled to make gains for decades. The PQ, now with only 4 members out of 125, nonetheless managed to set the agenda throughout the fall political season. Who would have thought, less than 18 months ago, that Paul St-Pierre Plamondon would now surpass François Legault in voters’ preferences for the position of premier?

October

A Conflict That Shocks, and Divides

On October 7, 2023, Hamas launched a surprise ground attack against Israel, which responded immediately and with overwhelming force. A conflict that is not new, but whose resurgence has seen an unprecedented escalation of violence. Images that shock, as much as the situation divides populations around the world.

A ceasefire was quickly called for, but the temporary truce did not materialize until late November, allowing some fifty hostages to be freed. Unfortunately, tensions quickly resurfaced, leading to a resumption of hostilities despite diplomatic efforts to contain them. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, who had been calling for a « humanitarian pause, » ultimately called for a « lasting ceasefire » in December, with Canada also supporting a motion to that effect at the United Nations General Assembly.

October

The Twelve Labours of Rebuilding the Quebec Liberal Party

Hovering around 15% in voting intentions, the Quebec Liberal Party (PLQ) appears to be scraping the bottom of the barrel in popular support. Eager to rediscover its purpose and embody the values that unite its members, the party commissioned former La Presse editorialist and senator André Pratte, along with MNA Madwa-Nika Cadet, to produce a report on its renewal. Praised by Jean Charest, the report titled S’affirmer, rassembler, prospérer, tabled at the last Liberal convention, garnered little public attention, with the media preferring to focus on potential leadership candidates. The party is also marked by an internal crisis: the only candidate openly interested in the leadership, MNA Fred Beauchemin, is the subject of a harassment complaint filed by the president of the young Liberals. Mr. Beauchemin was expelled from the Liberal caucus on October 7.

October

Violence in Schools: Prevention Over Cure

On October 27, Minister Drainville presented his Plan for the Prevention of Violence and Intimidation in Schools, built on four pillars: documentation, training, awareness, and support. The Plan represents an investment of $30 million over five years. Highly anticipated in the sector, it proposes a series of measures aimed at improving the prevention of violence in schools by strengthening the skills of school staff for more effective intervention in certain situations.

October

Reviving the 3rd Link to Better Bury the Tramway?

In the wake of his party’s defeat in Jean-Talon, Premier Legault surprised everyone, including members of his own caucus, by resurrecting the idea of a third highway link between Quebec City and Lévis. Abandoning the project had been costly for the CAQ, but the idea of reviving it did not quite have the intended effect.

A few weeks later, the tramway project, whose estimated costs had risen considerably, was taken out of the City of Quebec’s hands and entrusted to the Caisse de dépôt et placement du Québec, the project manager behind the REM in Montreal. The Caisse will have six months to determine the best structured transit project for Quebec City, including connectivity between the two shores (read: what form the famous third link might take).

November

The $5-to-7-Million Happy Hour That Hit a Nerve

Following an economic update delivered under the sign of inflation, Finance Minister Éric Girard announced a $5 to $7 million subsidy to host two preseason games of the Los Angeles Kings in Quebec City. In that context, the news stirred up controversy for several weeks. Opposition parties condemned the government’s inconsistency in unison, pointing out that the Finance Minister had announced a tightening of public spending just one week earlier. The decision even created the first publicly visible fractures within the CAQ caucus. Despite widespread disapproval, the Finance Minister stood his ground.

November

Housing, Are You There?

In November, Canada’s Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland presented an economic statement with a dual objective: to address the rising cost of living and respond to the housing crisis. The proposed measures, while relevant, proved relatively modest; notably, the launch of the Affordable Housing Fund, earmarked for the creation of community housing. Earlier that month, Quebec also announced a major housing investment ($900 million), matching Ottawa’s commitment through an agreement between the two governments. In addition to measures announced to address the rise in homelessness, these joint investments are expected to enable the construction of social and affordable housing (8,000 units by 2028), a demand that community groups have been calling for loudly.

On the Quebec side, it is impossible to ignore the sharp legislative battle, described as a « dialogue of the deaf, » between Housing Minister France-Hélène Duranceau and Québec solidaire MNA Andrés Fontecilla, during the study of Bill 31. The bill is expected to effectively put an end to lease assignments as we currently know them in Quebec. Unfortunately for the minister, the adoption of her bill was postponed until after the holiday break.

November

The Punk MNA Who Stirred Up Trouble

Two weeks before the Québec solidaire (QS) convention scheduled for late November, former MNA of the left-wing party Catherine Dorion released her explosive book Les têtes brulées: carnets d’espoir punk. She revisits her mixed experience at the National Assembly, including her difficult relationship with the media, the rigid structure of parliamentary work, and her relationship with QS co-spokesperson Gabriel Nadeau-Dubois. The book landed like a bombshell at a time when members were about to elect a new female co-spokesperson and Gabriel Nadeau-Dubois’s leadership role was being called into question, including by himself.

The membership ultimately emerged from the convention less divided than anticipated, with 90.1% support for Nadeau-Dubois and a new extra-parliamentary spokesperson described as coming « from rural Quebec, » former Rouyn-Noranda-Témiscamingue MNA Émilise Lessard-Therrien (elected by a narrow margin of 3 votes over her rival Ruba Ghazal). Which of the two will carry the banner as a potential premier candidate in the next election? The answer will come at QS’s pre-election convention, approximately one year before the 2026 vote.

November

Bill C-18, or the Clash of Titans

Passed in the federal parliament last June, Bill C-18 aims to compel the tech giants to compensate Canadian media for the use of their content. While Meta (the parent company of Facebook and Instagram, among others) decided to block Canadian media content on its platforms in retaliation, and Google threatened to remove their articles from its search engine, the federal government entered into a standoff that would intensify an already palpable crisis in the media sector. A crisis illustrated, among other things, by the closure of the Métro newspaper and mass layoffs at Bell, TVA and even the public broadcaster, CBC/Radio-Canada.

In support of the media, several governments, municipalities, political parties, associations, and businesses chose to boycott Meta’s advertising tools. A few weeks before the law came into force, and following a battle led head-on by Canadian Heritage Minister Pascale St-Onge, a compromise was ultimately reached with Google. On the Quebec side, Culture and Communications Minister Mathieu Lacombe is considering a media aid fund, long called for by many industry stakeholders. The question that remains: should the public broadcaster receive a share of the funds obtained from Google? Quebec has already made its position known.

December

A "Historic" Strike Movement

Fall 2023 was marked by a union mobilization movement described as historic. The Front commun (CSN, CSQ, FTQ, APTS), the FIQ and the FAE were engaged in a marathon of negotiations with the government that, as progress was deemed unsatisfactory, led to several rounds of strikes, including an indefinite strike in the case of the FAE. More than ever, union demands and government offers diverged, as negotiations appeared to stall. At issue: salary conditions and working conditions deemed unsustainable, whether in the education or health networks.

The government’s recent decisions, including a 30% salary increase for MNAs, an economic update revealing a slowdown in public investment, and the subsidy granted to the Los Angeles Kings, served as ammunition for the unions against the offers deemed insufficient by Treasury Board President Sonia Lebel. All the more so since her colleagues did not always help matters with their off-the-cuff remarks. In this saga that was difficult to follow, reaching a deal before the year-end holidays would have been an unexpected gift for everyone.

December

A Controversial Education Reform

Introduced by Minister Drainville last May, Bill 23 essentially aims to create a National Institute of Excellence in Education, to facilitate access to and use of data within the network, and to give the minister the power to appoint the heads of school service centres and to overturn their decisions if they conflict with the government’s objectives and orientations.

The bill, denounced by some stakeholders in the school community as centralizing, addresses primarily network governance, not the much-criticized labour shortage. Until the final study of the bill, several unions and education sector stakeholders called on the minister to abandon his reform. That did not happen: the bill was adopted on the last day of the session.

December

A Forced Entry for the Mammoth

In the previous session, Health Minister Christian Dubé had promised to « shake the pillars of the temple » with his Bill 15. In the end, the mammoth legislation, nearly 1,200 articles long, was passed under closure in the early hours of Saturday morning, setting aside the detailed study of nearly 400 articles and several hundred other amendments.

Criticism from opposition parties over the manner of adoption pushed Christian Dubé to post a video on social media Sunday evening, touting his reform. Bill 15 will introduce several organizational changes in the health sector, most notably at the highest level, by creating the Santé Québec agency, which will henceforth manage all network operations. It remains to be seen what concrete changes this much-debated reform will bring to the daily lives of network employees and, above all, to patient access to care.