Joël Lightbound

Mail delivery on hold across Canada as postal strike resumes

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Mail delivery on hold across Canada as postal strike resumes

Ruby Pratka, Local Journalism Initiative reporter

editor@qctonline.com

Canadians will have to do without mail delivery until further notice. The Canadian Union of Postal Workers (CUPW) declared an indefinite general strike on Sept. 25.

CUPW members have been without a collective agreement since August 2024, and first walked off the job in November of that year. At the height of the holiday shopping season, then-labour minister Steven MacKinnon referred the dispute to the Canadian Industrial Relations Board (CIRB), which ruled that the two parties were at an impasse. Postal workers were ordered back to work on Dec. 17, and continued work until May 22 under the existing agreement, while negotiations went on with the aid of a mediator. When that deadline passed, as negotiations ground on, the union declared an overtime strike, but continued daily mail delivery.

That tenuous stopgap arrangement came to an abrupt end on Sept. 25, shortly after Minister for Public Services and Procurement Joël Lightbound announced the federal government’s restructuring plan for Canada Post.

The plan Lightbound laid out, based on recommendations from CIRB negotiator William Kaplan, included the end of daily mail delivery, the phasing out of almost all door-to-door delivery in favour of community mailboxes over the next decade, lifting a 30-year-old moratorium on the closure of rural post offices, raising the cost of stamps, asking Canada Post Corporation (CPC) to “take another look” at its management structure and conducting a detailed review of the corporation’s activities to identify where costs can be cut and activities adapted. “I’m instructing Canada Post to come back with a plan that will ensure protection for [services in] rural, remote and Indigenous communities,” he added. “Canada Post has an obligation to serve every community in Canada, and that will not change.”

Within hours of Lightbound’s announcement, CUPW locals in Atlantic Canada declared a general strike, followed by locals in the rest of the country. In a statement, CUPW national president Jan Simpson called Lightbound’s plan “an outrage.”

Simpson accused Lightbound of springing the plan on postal workers with insufficient advance notice and dodging questions about potential job losses. “This slapdash approach without full public consultation is an insult to the public and to postal workers,” she said.

In a statement, CPC warned Canadians to expect delivery delays, noting that an essential services agreement was in place to ensure delivery of social assistance cheques and live animals.

“We’re disappointed that the union chose to escalate their strike activity, which will further deteriorate Canada Post’s financial situation,” the corporation said.

Stéphane Genest is the president of CUPW local 370, which represents postal workers in the greater Quebec City region, Beauce, Charlevoix and Chaudière-Appalaches. He told the QCT the announcement of a new strike came as a total surprise to local mail carriers. Members “are very disappointed, but I don’t know if we could have done things any differently.” Genest said he hoped the government and CPC would take the opportunity to expand CPC’s operations into new sectors – such as banking – instead of cutting services. “We’re not blind, we know letter mail volumes are going down … but we have the impression that [CPC and the government] want to go toward privatization instead of finding solutions.” Genest said that in his 22 years as a mail carrier, there has never been a negotiated collective agreement between CUPW and CPC. “The last signed agreement is from the 1990s. Since then, Canada Post has always gone crying to the government [for arbitration],” he said. “I’m impatient to see their response to the strike.”

Lightbound, who represents the Quebec City riding of Louis- Hébert in Parliament, did not respond to a request for further comment from the QCT by press time; nor did CPC.

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Quebec City native, astronaut Marc Garneau dies at 76

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Quebec City native, astronaut Marc Garneau dies at 76

Ruby Pratka, Local Journalism Initiative reporter

Quebec City native, former cabinet minister and Canadian space pioneer Marc Garneau died on June 4. He was 76.

Marc Roy, Garneau’s former communications director, shared a brief statement from Garneau’s wife, Pamela Garneau, announcing the news.

“Marc faced his final days with the same strength, clarity and grace that defined his life. He passed away peacefully, surrounded by the love of his family,” Pamela Garneau wrote. “We are especially grateful to the medical team which provided such dedicated and compassionate care during his short illness.”

Garneau was born in Quebec City in 1949 – “in the old Jeffery Hale Hospital, the one in Vieux- Québec,” as he recounted to CBC’s Alison Brunette during the 2023 Literary Feast at the Morrin Centre. When he was a child, his family moved frequently due to his father’s military career. He studied engineering at the Royal Military College before completing a PhD at the Imperial College of Science and Technology in London, England, and joining the Navy as a combat systems engineer. In 1983, he was named one of Canada’s first six astronauts. The following year, aboard the Space Shuttle Challenger, he became the first Canadian in space.

“Take me back to that moment, you’re sitting there – 10, nine, eight … what’s going through your mind?” Brunette asked Garneau at the Literary Feast.

“If you imagine yourselves tipped over backward looking at the ceiling, that’s what your seat is like,” Garneau said as guests tipped their heads back. “There are people who sit you in your seat … and connect your radio, your oxygen, so you’re ready to go. Then they say good luck and close the hatch … You’re left there for two and a half hours before launch, the longest two and a half hours of your life. A lot of things go through your mind – do I really want to do this? Am I ready? … You realize you are ready, and you’re going to live something that very few people have ever experienced.

“When you see the entire planet, your perspective starts to change,” he said. “You see that this planet is the cradle of humanity … there’s nowhere else to go, and we have to find a way to get along with each other.”

The Challenger mission was the first of Garneau’s three trips to space. In 2001, he was named president of the Canadian Space Agency (CSA).

Garneau resigned from the CSA to run for Parliament as a Liberal in 2006. He lost on that first attempt, but won comfortably in Westmount–Saint Louis on his second try in 2008. His engineer’s directness and attention to detail made him popular with journalists and colleagues. He ran for the Liberal leadership in 2013 before throwing his support behind Justin Trudeau. Trudeau named him transport minister in his first cabinet, later promoting him to foreign affairs. He resigned in March 2023; at the time, he said he had promised his family he would step down after the joint committee on medical assistance in dying, on which he sat, had tabled its final report.

In retirement, he wrote an autobiography, A Most Extraordinary Ride: Space, Politics and the Pursuit of a Canadian Dream. One of his last public appearances was at the Morrin Centre, during this year’s Imagination Writers’ Festival, promoting the book.

Barry McCullough, executive director of the Morrin Centre, described his death from cancer as a “huge shock.”

“He was interesting and interested,” McCullough remembered. “He seemed like a really genuine person, and he had a lot of curiosity, which would be a good quality for an astronaut. He was born in Quebec City, went off and did all kinds of things, and then came back and connected with the English-speaking community, which is cool, because he has lived in both languages so he’s a really good spokesperson for bilingualism.”

Local Liberal MPs Jean-Yves Duclos and Joël Lightbound served alongside Garneau in Parliament. Lightbound called his passing “an immense loss for Canada.”

“I owe a lot to Marc,” Duclos wrote in a social media post. “He generously offered me his mentorship when I first became an MP. I will always remember his intelligence, his sense of duty and respect, and his commitment to his family. He repeatedly expressed to me his pride in being from the Quebec City region – a region whose interests he always helped me defend.”

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Lightbound joins Carney’s first full cabinet

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Lightbound joins Carney’s first full cabinet

Ruby Pratka, Local Journalism Initiative reporter

editor@qctonline.com

The procession of 28 cabinet ministers and soon-to-be ministers and 10 secretaries of state filing into Rideau Hall in Ottawa to be sworn on May 13 featured a mix of established senior ministers and new faces.

Prime Minister Mark Carney’s first full cabinet featured Dominic LeBlanc as president of the King’s Privy Council for Canada and minister for Canada-U.S. trade, intergovernmental affairs and one Canadian economy; former foreign affairs minister Mélanie Joly as minister of industry and regional economic development for Quebec and Carney’s de facto Quebec lieutenant François-Philippe Champagne as minister of finance and national revenue. Former defence minister Anita Anand received the foreign affairs portfolio, Sean Fraser became justice minister, Da- vid McGuinty was named to national defence and Carney’s one-time Liberal leadership rival Chrystia Freeland was appointed minister of transport and internal trade. Steven Guilbeault was named minister of identity, culture and official languages.

Among the newcomers to Carney’s cabinet was Louis-Hébert MP Joël Lightbound. Lightbound, 37, former secretary of state for emergency preparedness, was shuffled out of Cabinet in 2022 after a public disagreement with then-prime minister Justin Trudeau over pandemic policy. In his first ministerial post, as he himself pointed out, Lightbound will take over responsibility for the government’s oldest ministry (public services and procurement) and one of its newest (governmental transformation).

“I’ve never approached a cabinet shuffle with any kind of expectations, and I’ve always been happy as an MP … but to receive the call was a huge honour,” Lightbound told the QCT.

Lightbound said his brief as minister of governmental transformation was to find “another angle, another im- pulsion, on how we can have a more efficient state” by leveraging new technology, including but not limited to artificial intelligence. His mission includes looking into how best practices from around the world can be implemented in Canada to keep costs from rising. His stated goal is to bring the annual increase in government spending down from an average of nine per cent to two per cent.

On the public transportation front, he said the government planned to deploy a $3-billion nationwide fund for public transit, and “part of that” would be set aside for the federal government’s ongoing contribution to the Quebec City TramCité project. He added that the Quebec government also “needs to prioritize” the project.

Lightbound will be the only minister from the Quebec City region in the Carney cabinet. Neither former health minister Jean-Yves Duclos (Québec-Centre) nor Steeve Lavoie (Beauport-Limoilou), the former head of the Chambre de commerce et d’industrie de Québec, received a cabinet post. In public statements since the April 28 election, both Duclos and Lightbound have emphasized the importance of working as a team – “le trio de Québec” – to move forward on regional priorities. “Teamwork is fundamental, and it was a blessing to have two Liberals in Parliament to advance regional files,” Lightbound said, describing Duclos as a “very classy person” from whom he has learned a lot over the years. Newcomer Lavoie is “one ally more.”

Lightbound said his other major priorities included working to increase housing availability in his riding and maintain federal support for research institutions such as Université Laval. “I want to thank the people of Louis-Hébert for their renewed vote of confidence,” he added.

Other notable newcomers to cabinet included Haitian-born psychologist, former Trudeau chief of staff and first-time MP Marjorie Michel as health minister; Julie Dabrusin as minister of environment and climate change; former Nova Scotia immigration minister Lena Metlege Diab as federal immigration minister; and Trudeau critic Wayne Long as secretary of state for Revenue Canada and the banking sector. Mandy Gull-Masty, MP for Abitibi–Baie-James–Nunavik–Eeyou and former chief of the Cree Nation Government, was named minister of Indigenous services, the first Indigenous MP to hold that position.

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Local Liberal MPs absent from Carney cabinet

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Local Liberal MPs absent from Carney cabinet

Ruby Pratka, Local Journalism Initiative reporter

editor@qctonline.com

As Prime Minister Mark Carney and the 23 ministers of his Cabinet were sworn in at Rideau Hall on March 14, several faces and portfolios were noticeably absent. Former public services and procurement minister and MP for Québec Jean-Yves Duclos and former fisheries minister and Gaspésie–Îles- de-la-Madeleine MP Diane LeBouthiller, both of whom had served continuously in outgoing prime minister Justin Trudeau’s cabinet since 2015, were not part of Carney’s cabinet; of the seven Quebecers in Carney’s cabinet, none was from a riding east of Montreal. The official languages; seniors; women, gender equality and youth; labour and regional economic development port- folios were among those that went unfilled or were consolidated into other ministries.

In a brief address to reporters, Carney said his slimmed- down cabinet would “focus on the essentials and focus on action to [address] challenges which we face … changing the way we work so we can deliver better results faster.” He said the “smaller but more experienced team” of ministers was “made to meet the moment we were in.”

Opposition leaders were quick to spotlight what they saw as omissions in Carney’s cabinet. Conservative Lead- er Pierre Poilievre and Bloc Québécois Leader Yves-François Blanchet criticized the lack of eastern Quebec representation, presenting it as an indication of lack of respect for francophones. NDP leader Jagmeet Singh, for his part, said the lack of ministers for women and gender equality, youth and labour sent the message that issues important for women, minorities and workers “didn’t matter” to the Carney government. “His plan is to ignore the plight of working people … to cut services and cut workers, which is not the right plan for Canadians,” he said.

Louis-Hébert Liberal MP Joël Lightbound, who was named parliamentary secretary to the minister of public safety and emergency preparedness before a public disagreement with Trudeau over COVID policy in 2022 cost him his Cabinet seat, said he understood Carney’s desire for a smaller Cabinet.

“I understand the desire for Mr. Carney to have a very lean cabinet focused on the challenges that we’re facing and have a clear and sharp focus on how we build resilience,” Lightbound told the QCT. “This a special circumstance given that we are heading into an election, probably in the next few days.

“I’m very honoured to have worked with Mr. [Jean-Yves] Duclos. I’m proud of the work he has done over the years and I’m not worried about the weight of Quebec City in the Carney government,” said Lightbound. “The two of us, the two Liberal MPs [in the region] for the last 10 years, we have done a lot more than Conservative ministers in the region have done in the previous decade, and certainly more than the Bloc have done.” Lightbound highlighted the federal government’s preservation of the Quebec Bridge and the inclusion of the Davie Shipyard in Lévis in the long-term naval strategy as achievements he was particularly proud of.

Both Duclos, who could not immediately be reached for comment, and Lightbound have announced their intention to run again in the upcoming election, widely expected to take place this spring.

“We want to make sure that the government is there to finance the TramCité project [and] to fund research at Université Laval in my riding,” Lightbound said. “Top of mind for me will be to make sure we are smart in the way we address tariffs, so Quebec entrepreneurs and jobs are protected.”

Lightbound said he was “really looking forward” to working with Carney and his appointees. “He is the right person at the right time for this extraordinary junction in our country’s history,” he concluded.

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Few party candidates nominated in city as federal election looms

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Few party candidates nominated in city as federal election looms

Peter Black, Local Journalism Initiative reporter

peterblack@qctonline.com

With a federal election call expected sometime soon, only the Bloc Québécois has candidates nominated in all seven ridings in the Quebec City region.

The Bloc, with leader Yves- François Blanchet in attendance, introduced its slate at a news conference in the city on March 13.

In addition to its two incumbent MPs – Caroline Desbiens in Montmorency-Charlevoix and Julie Vignola in Beauport- Limoilou – the Bloc has nominated Simon Bérubé in the riding of Québec-Centre (formerly Québec), Christian Hébert in Portneuf–Jacques-Cartier, Valérie Savard in Louis-Hébert, Bladimir Labonite Infante in Charlesbourg–Haute-Sainte-Charles, and Martin Trudel in Louis-Saint-Laurent–Akiawenhrahk.

That latter riding is one of several in the country whose name has been changed to reflect Indigenous heritage.

Conservatives hold three seats in the region, and all three incumbent MPs are nominated to run again: Pierre Paul-Hus, the Quebec lieutenant of leader Pierre Poilievre, in Charlesbourg–Haute-Saint- Charles; Gérard Deltell in Louis-Saint-Laurent–Akiawenhrahk; and Joël Godin in Portneuf–Jacques-Cartier.

According to the party website, no other candidates have been nominated. Paul-Hus’s office had not returned a call by press time.

The Liberals are only slightly more advanced in finding and nominating candidates. The two incumbents are running again: Jean-Yves Duclos, recently excluded from Prime Minister Mark Carney’s slimmed-down cabinet, in Québec-Centre; and Joël Lightbound in Louis-Hébert.

The only other nominated candidate for the Liberals as of late last week was Denise Coulonval in Beauport-Limoilou. The seat has seen close three- way races between the Bloc, Conservatives and Liberals over the past three elections (2015, 2029, 2021).

A Liberal party official who asked to remain anonymous said there has been an increased interest in Quebec from potential candidates now that Mark Carney is leader and prime minister.

The New Democratic Party, which swept most ridings in the city in the “Orange Wave” of 2011, has nominated two candidates so far, both repeat candidates. Former Beauport- Limoilou MP Raymond Coté is making his second attempt since the 2015 election to recapture the riding. Tommy Bureau is running for a third time in Québec-Centre, after coming fourth in 2021 and 2019. The NDP won the seat in the 2011 election, ending the Bloc’s Christiane Gagnon’s 18-year hold on the downtown riding.

Maxime Bernier’s People’s Party of Canada has no seats in Parliament, but it has can- didates nominated in five of the seven ridings in the region. The Green Party, which has yet to elect a candidate in Quebec, has so far nominated candidates in three area ridings.

On the South Shore, Conservative incumbent Jacques Gourde and Liberal challenger Ghislain Daigle are nominated in Lévis-Lotbinière. In Bellechasse–Les-Etchemins–Lévis, Conservative MP Dominique Vien is nominated, as is Marie-Philippe Gagnon- Gauthier for the NDP.

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