Peter Black\
May 8, 2024
Local Journalism Initiative reporter
Peterblack@qctonline.com
Is it already a dozen years ago since the streets of Quebec’s cities were ringing with the song of angry men (and women), when the beating of their hearts echoed the beating of the drums (or pots and pans, as was the case)?
With apologies to the authors of Les Misérables, we look back at that thrilling revolutionary time in Quebec known as “the Maple Spring” which is a less ironic translation of Printemps d’Érable – riffing off the Printemps Arabe (Arab Spring) movement which tried and famously failed to bring a whiff of democracy to dictatorships in the Arab world,
(Wouldn’t it be nice if all the free-speech-protected anti-Israel campus protests currently happening in the Western world stirred another liberation movement among the folks whose “freedom” they are demanding? We digress.)
The Quebec student uprising was to protest the plan of the Jean Charest government to hike bargain tuition fees $350 over five years to bring them in line with the other provinces.
After some 700 protests on campuses around the province, a few involving ugly clashes with police, the ultimate result was the defeat of the Charest government in September 2012 and repeal of the hike by the incoming Parti Québécois government of Pauline Marois, which slapped a cost-of-living index on the fees instead.
Quebec today still has the lowest average undergraduate tuition fee in Canada at $3,461 – we don’t get into the recent anti-English out-of-province fee hikes here – but that modest rate is still a far cry from the free tuition the student protesters demanded.
Oh well, it was the good fight.
We revisit this spell of student revolutionary fervour because perhaps the most prominent student leader at the time, Gabriel Nadeau-Dubois, is facing a similar quandary of idealism versus practicality in his current leadership role.
GND graduated quickly from student politics to the big time, winning a 2017 byelection in a Montreal riding to replace outgoing Québec Solidaire co-leader Françoise David. Shortly afterwards, the socialist student superstar became the male co-spokesperson of the party, sharing leadership duties with veteran activist Manon Massé.
Dare we say there’s always been something a little odd about this notion of male and female co-spokespersons, as if the party was unwilling to accept it actually needs a single identifiable leader.
Last week, faced with the intra-party furore caused by the sudden resignation, four months after she was elected, of his female co-spokesperson, former Rouyn-Noranda–Témiscamingue MNA Émilise Lessard-Therrien, Nadeau-Dubois decided he’s had enough of the socialist family feud.
He announced, after a day off to reflect, the time has come for QS to grow up and act like a party prepared and willing to govern.
There are certainly questions about GND’s leadership style, coming not just in light of Lessard-Therrien’s departure, but also from enigmatic former Quebec City MNA Catherine Dorion, who accused GND, in her recent book about her brief time as a politician, of trying to turn QS into a “traditional party.”
GND, who makes a tidy $177,000 as leader of the third Opposition group, told reporters the party needs to be more pragmatic if it wants to expand its base beyond the leftist core that in the 2022 election gave it 11 seats with 15 per cent of the vote.
Since then, for a number of reasons, the Parti Québécois, with only four MNAs, has siphoned off support from QS and rides high in the polls, while the Solidaires are slumping, with no apparent room for growth.
How exactly GND proposes to drag a notoriously fractious and doctrinaire formation toward the centre is anyone’s guess. He has proposed a series of chantiers for the party to find a way to “modernize” its platform.
Some parties are happy to be eternal fringe, protest or ideological groups – witness the federal Greens or NDP. QS, though, risks being squeezed out of the picture entirely, particularly if the next vote in 2026 turns out to be a “referendum” election with the PQ in contention.
Should Nadeau-Dubois’ QS comrades resist his long march to the middle, one suspects the former student rebel might embrace the path of pragmatism and find himself in a more “traditional” party that has realistic hopes of governing.
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