Sarah Rennie – LJI reporter
Liberal candidate Nathalie Provost launched her campaign to represent the Châteauguay-Les Jardins-de-Napierville riding on March 29, while inaugurating her campaign offices in Chateauguay in the presence of volunteers and supporters.
An engineer and gun control advocate, Provost was among the survivors of the 1989 École Polytechnique shootings who founded the PolySeSouvient advocacy group. Her work as an activist for gun control and the prevention of violence against women and children led her to serve as vice-chair of the Canadian Firearms Registry from 2017 to 2019. She now holds senior management positions in the civil service of the Quebec government, where she is currently on leave from her position with the Ministère de l’Environnement, de la Lutte Contre les Changements Climatiques, de la Faune et des Parcs.
The mother of four young adults, Provost has maintained close ties with the Châteauguay-Les Jardins-de-Napierville riding both professionally and through family connections. She says the riding is similar to her hometown in the Berthier-Maskinongé region, which is also very agricultural. “It is the same environment in which I was born,” she says, noting she is very comfortable in both the rural and urban worlds.
Provost is also very aware that her riding runs along the border and that security and trade issues are very important. “I worked with my counterparts in my past job with New York State representatives and I know we can work together and that the quality of our relationship with our neighbors. Even if it’s very, very strange at the higher levels right now, we have to work on the ground,” she says.
She adds that she is pushing the Liberal Party to talk about the issues facing the farming community. “We are talking about industrialization, we are talking about productivity, but we are not really talking about agriculture,” she points out.
Provost insists that if elected, she will make sure the voices of those from the southern part of the region, including the municipalities that until very recently were counted as part of the former Salaberry-Suroît riding, will be heard in Ottawa. She says it will be important despite the vast territory covered by the riding. “With the pandemic, we learned to work with distance,” she explains, noting that accessibility is a priority for her campaign.
Beauharnois-Salaberry-Soulanges-Huntingdon
A soon-to-be engineer has thrown his hat in the ring for the Liberal party in the Beauharnois-Salaberry-Soulanges-Huntingdon riding. Miguel Perras is a third-year mechanical engineering student at the École Polytechnique in Montreal, where he is involved in the university debate club and parliamentary simulations.
The 21-year-old says that while his candidacy may be somewhat unconventional, he is driven by a “strong desire to represent my region and defend the issues that affect our daily lives.”
Perras grew up on a small family farm where he says he learned the value of hard work, resilience, and commitment. He says that having worked on both the factory floor and in engineering offices within the metallurgy industry, he has seen the impacts of the economic conditions created by current trade relations.
He joined the Liberal party, but suggests he believes many of the issues facing the region transcend party lines. Perras admits that while he had always planned on becoming more directly involved with politics, he did not think the day would come so soon.