federal Liberal leadership

Liberal leadership hopefuls court minister Jean-Yves Duclos

Peter Black, Local Journalism Initiative reporter

peterblack@qctonline.com

He has worked alongside one, but shares a profession with the other.

Québec MP and Public Services and Procurement Minister Jean-Yves Duclos has yet to decide which of the two presumed front-runners he will support in the federal Liberal leadership race – former finance minister Chrystia Freeland or former governor of the Bank of Canada and then the Bank of England Mark Carney.

As of this writing, Carney, Freeland and Liberal House Leader Karina Gould are the most prominent contenders who have officially announced their intention to replace Justin Trudeau. Candidates have until Jan. 27 to pay the $350,000 entry fee to enter the race. The winner is to be announced March 9.

In a Jan. 17 interview with the QCT, Duclos said he had not yet decided on a candidate to support. “I am waiting for all candidates to have had the opportunity to launch their campaign … Once that is done, I will give them a little time to share their platforms and we’ll look more carefully at the way in which the contribution of Quebec to the federation appears. I strongly believe, and many others do, that Canada is stronger because Quebec is part of Canada, and I would like to see how the platforms of the candidates enable that strong social, economic and environmental sensitivity and contribution of Quebecers [to] feature in the candidates’ platforms.”

Duclos said he would have liked to see a francophone candidate in the race despite the so-called Liberal Party tradition of alternance between anglophone and francophone leaders. He said it is important that candidates “be bilingual, but also important to engage with and relate to people of the two official languages, whoever they may be and wherever they may be in Canada.”

(Former Montreal-area MP Frank Baylis, who is completely bilingual, has also said he wants to run for the leadership).

Duclos, first elected in the Liberal wave of 2015, said he “shares characteristics” with both Freeland and Carney. He said he has worked closely with Freeland on such challenges as the federal government’s ac- quisition of the Quebec Bridge. They also co-chaired the government’s COVID pandemic response cabinet committee when Duclos was minister of health.

“We spent a lot of time trying to save jobs and lives,” Duclos said.

As for Carney, a fellow economist by training, Duclos said, “We therefore share the same type of language, the same type of empirical ability to under- stand how to grow the economy while sharing the benefits as equally as possible, so we have that in common. I know him less well than I know Chrystia, but I’m sure I’ll connect with him quite easily.”

Duclos said Carney, Freeland and other candidates have reached out to him seeking his support.

As for a new leader improving the Liberals’ fortunes in an election that will likely come in the spring, Duclos said, “I think it will help, because unfortunately, until the prime minister announced [his] resignation … there was too much focus on him, on his leadership.

“The Conservatives in par- ticular had been very good at attacking him, personal attacks and all that, the social media, the polarization. He had become too much the focus of a lot of negative attention, and that was unfortunately not only harsh and hard on the party, but also obviously even harsher and more cruel on him, himself.”

Duclos said, “Moving to a new leader allows [Trudeau] to invest all of his energy into defending the interests of Canada in the context of [U.S. President Donald] Trump com- ing into office, so he does that full time now while leaving to someone else the hard work of preparing for the next election.

“I think it’s good that this is happening, and I’ve already been feeling informally in my environment here in Quebec City in particular, that this is making a difference in the minds of people. People are saying, OK, fine, Trudeau has given it up, but he’s now passing the puck to someone else for the campaign and investing all of his energy into protecting us against President Trump.”

Duclos has said he plans to run in the next election.