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Writing the Tories’ Quebec obituary

On Oct. 1, hours before the French-language leaders’ debate, Le Soleil published a poll that put the Conservatives neck and neck with the Bloc Québécois in Quebec, and described the Liberals as “going down in flames” in a distant third place. Oh what, a difference a week makes.

Eight days later, on Oct. 10, La Presse published a poll under the headline “Stephen Harper on the decline in Quebec” which showed the Conservatives down as much as 11 points in the province since the middle of the campaign, lagging 22 points behind the Bloc Québécois and barely ahead of the Liberals. The poll showed some well-known Conservative incumbents, including Labour Minister Jean-Pierre Blackburn, trailing in their ridings. This only a day after another poll showed the Conservatives trailing in five hotly-contested ridings in which they had been hoping to gain seats.

The Quebec media spent much of the week trying to explain the Conservatives’ precipitous decline in the province. In a column addressing the Tories’ inability to pull ahead in several key ridings in the Quebec City area – the province’s Conservative stronghold – Le Soleil’s Jean-Simon Gagné called the party’s election strategy “suicidal.” Mr. Gagné argued that the Conservatives’ “maniacal” control of its local candidates’ public appearances and failure to release a regional platform will be to blame if the party fails to get the results it was hoping for in the area.

Le Journal de Montreal’s Marco Fortier blamed the Conservatives’ decline on Mr. Harper’s decision to campaign for 31 days “without a game plan” as well as his “lack of compassion” for Canadians affected by the economic crisis.

In his attempt to explain why the expected “wave of Conservatism” hasn’t materialized in the province, Radio-Canada’s Michel C. Auger pointed to the Conservatives’ pre-election cuts to Quebec economic development organizations as a major factor.

La Presse’s Alain Dubuc accused the Tories of “misreading Quebec” and pointed to the party’s mishandling of the culture issue as a key misstep. And Vincent Marissal weighed in on Friday, calling the Conservatives’ decision to wait until the last week of a campaign to release a program “too little too late” and arguing that Mr. Harper had already “lost the battle on the economy.”

Mr. Marissal summed up the Conservatives’ performance by comparing the party to “a football team at the one yard line with four downs, who just can’t score a touchdown.”

What’s a little name-calling among friends?

The Tories’ Quebec woes have been almost entirely to the benefit of the Bloc Québécois, and Gilles Duceppe was more fired up than ever over the past week as he rode the wave of anti-Conservative momentum.

On Sunday, Mr. Duceppe spoke to a crowd of 2,000 supporters in Saint-Hyacinthe, Quebec and delivered what La Presse called his “most violent tirade against Stephen Harper since the beginning of the campaign.” Calling it “an exercise in mass destruction,” Le Soleil’s Raymond Giroux reported that the Bloc leader called Mr. Harper “an arrogant reactionary, a cheater and a liar” (among other things).

Mr. Duceppe’s aggressive attacks on Harper did not deter him from, less than 24 hours later, from telling Montreal radio host Paul Arcand that he would consider entering into “timely alliances” with other parties in the future, including Mr. Harper’s Conservatives, as long as it was in support of bills he felt would be favourable to Quebeckers. As Le Devoir put it, even though Mr. Duceppe “drags Stephen Harper through the mud day after day,” he is perfectly fine with the idea of collaborating with a new minority Harper government.

Later the same day, in an article in La Presse, Mr. Harper responded to Mr. Duceppe’s latest attacks. “The problem with Mr. Duceppe,” he said. “Is that he helped me bring down the Liberal government three years ago … It’s a little late for him to call us the devil.”

Bernier of the Beauce

Despite the controversy surrounding the release of ex-girlfriend Julie Couillard’s tell-all autobiography, “Mon Histoire” (“My Story”), La Presse’s Isabelle Hachey finds that many of Maxime Bernier’s constituents are squarely on his side as the former foreign affairs minister runs for re-election in the Beauce region of Quebec.

At a bookstore in the town of Saint-Georges, Ms. Hachey finds a copy of “Mon Histoire” hidden behind a pile of other books. “We’ve hardly sold any copies,” explains the owner of the store. “For people around here, Maxime is their God. They won’t buy this book.” After speaking to several other supporters of Mr. Bernier, Ms. Hachey concludes that Ms. Couillard has failed if she was hoping to hurt Mr. Bernier’s chances of re-election.

Mr. Harper has refused to say whether he would consider giving Mr. Bernier a new cabinet post in a Conservative government. But Le Journal de Montreal’s Marco Fortier points out that considering how poorly other Conservative candidates are faring in Quebec, short of appointing another senator, Mr. Harper may have little choice.

Blogue of the Week

Voir’s Josée Legault compiles a round-up of the biggest surprises of the election campaign in Quebec.

Among the highlights: Premier Jean Charest’s vocal participation, Stéphane Dion’s strong performance in the debates, and Gilles Duceppe’s success in rallying Quebeckers around the Bloc. As Ms. Legault points out, “even Margaret Atwood said she’d vote for the Bloc if she lived in Quebec.”

Special to The Globe and Mail