The Decibel - What Legault’s resignation means for Quebec

Episode Date: January 20, 2026

Last week, Quebec Premier François Legault announced his resignation amidst plummeting poll numbers, while acknowledging Quebeckers are calling for change. The state of the province’s politics are now in flux, as the Parti Quebecois surge in popularity and a possible referendum on Quebec’s sovereignty is on the horizon.Konrad Yakabuski, Globe columnist and Quebec politics writer, discusses Legault’s legacy, the divide between sovereigntists and federalists and where the province’s parties stand ahead of a fall election.Questions? Comments? Ideas? Email us at [e-mail] Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

For the bien of my party and, especially for the bien of Quebec, I announce today that I'm going to quit my post of Prime Minister of Quebec. I'll rest in place the time that my party design a replacement or

a replacement. This past week, Quebec Premier Francois-Lago announced his resignation. Logo has let his party, the Coalition Avenir Quebec, or KAC, to successive majorities since 2018. And in that time, he went from Canada's most popular premier to its least.

Lago's party was designed to chart a new path in Quebec politics, putting aside the question of sovereignty. But now, as he steps down without a clear successor, the future of Quebec's politics and the issue of separation is unclear. Today, Globe columnist Conrad Yakubusky joins us from Montreal. He'll tell us what led up to Lago's resignation and where all the parties stand. as the province looks toward an election this fall. I'm Cheryl Sutherland, and this is the decibel from the Globe and Mail. Hi, Conrad, great to have you on the show. Thanks for having me.

So Francois Legoe announced his resignation last week, and he said that it was clear that Quebecers were calling for change, including a change in Premier. Was this a surprise? It was a surprise to most people because Mr. Legoe was adamant before Christmas that he was not stepping down. and most people believed him because unlike the Justin Trudeau's situation where there was a lot of open caucus descent and there was an heir apparent waiting, that was not the situation in the CACC.

Mr. Lago founded the Coalition Avenue of Quebec in 2011. It was his party. He dominated the party. It's not a party with deep grassroots. So he was adamant that the polls in December and over the past year did not reflect where the Quebec electorate actually. stood because they weren't focusing on an election. They were more focused on Donald Trump. And Mr. Lago believed that when you looked at the other party leaders, that he stood at wrong

chance of making a comeback, especially as Quebecers focused on the question of whether or not to hold a referendum, which is the core promise of the Patsy-Gepeco, which has been leading in the polls. What changed is over the past year, you've seen a number of resignations in the CAC, but what really sealed the deal was that after Mr. Lago made his year-end interviews, the day after all of those interviews ran on TV, A Radio Canada, his health minister resigned. And Cautier de Be, his health minister, had been there at the beginning of the CACC. He was considered Mr. Lago's most solid minister. held a number of portfolios, but there was a fundamental disagreement over Mr. Dubei's health

reform, which sought to tie doctor's salaries to performance targets. There was massive discontent in the public when doctors started saying, we're going to leave Quebec if this reform goes through. People were saying that was kind of like his Freeland moment, right? Right. That's a good point. Yeah. Because, I mean, Christian Freeland, obviously so strongly associated with Mr. Trudeau. and then just a market break. So when Christian de Bea went, it left the impression of government in disarray. And the most recent poll came out

just before Mr. Lugo's resignation had the cac at 11%. Wow, that is pretty low. What is the mood in Quebec with this shakeup? Like, were people waiting for this? How are people feeling about it? Well, people are happy. I mean, there's a lot of sympathy for Mr. Lago.

He's a very likable figure for Quebec Francophones because he conveyed a kind of folksy image and a comforting image, you know, that things don't have to change radically. You know, we can be Quebecers in the way that we're Quebecers. And in a world that is rapidly changing,

that sort of provide a lot of comfort and the fact that, you know, he led Quebec during the pandemic, almost like a father. And that was the comparison that people made. I mean, continually, he was referred to his uncle, Francois, a guiding figure that didn't want to divide people.

He sought not to defied people. I mean, it was very polarizing a period. That said, I mean, the pandemic is what gave life to the Conservative Party in Quebec, you know, viscerally opposed to public health measures. So, yeah, there's a lot of sympathy for him, but at the same time, a feeling that it's time for him to go. Okay. Let's talk about what Lugo represented, because he founded the KACC in. in 2011. And at one point in his tenure, he actually became the most popular premier in Canada. What was Logo offering to Quebecers with this new party?

So when the KAC was founded in 2011, he founded the party with Christian Seiroir, who was an investor-entrepreneur, who had well known he had been a CEO of a number of companies. And the focus was decidedly on economic issues. Quebec is facing economic challenges. At the time, its population was, growing very slowly. We had a number of incidents in which there had been a series of infrastructure failures and the fact that Quebec had neglected the maintenance of its core infrastructure, highways, bridges, subways, public transit, and that the focus on the federalist sovereignty issue over the past 45 years had distracted from those important questions. And so Lago founded the KACC saying, we're going to put this question. of Quebec's political status in Canada on a whole

to tackle our economic issues. Some called this the third way in Quebec politics. And so this idea that an accountant who had founded Air Transat, who had been a Parts-Chequequeor minister, but, you know, one of the more moderate ministers in Parts-Chebecois, Francois-Belago. So there was a lot of appeal to that.

And there was an appetite for something new in Quebec at the time, at the same time. I mean, the KAC also represented a return to the past before sovereignty, the whole sovereignty and issue came to dominate the Quebec political landscape because in the pre-PATs-Kébecro era, Quebec did have a center-right party or a right of center party in the Union National,

the Moist de Plicy, and largely focused on the same playbook as the KAC in terms of focusing on Quebec's economy and also portraying Ottawa as a threat, you know, constant fights with the federal government versus the Liberal Party of Quebec, which had always been more of a hardcore federalist party. And you've actually written that Lagos downfall marks the most spectacular slide in recent Canadian political history. What happened? And why do you say that? Well, because, you know, Justin Trudeau, in comparison, was never as popular as Francoise de Gauss.

So to compare the slides, it's just, it's not even close because Frasso Lago had an approval rating approaching 90% during the pandemic. Incredible. I mean, it was unheard of. And in his first term, I mean, he won a second mandate, a large majority with, you know, more than 80% of the seats in the National Assembly. Things went downhill rapidly after that, after he was reelected. And a lot of governments in their second mandate, they seemed to lose focus under his economy and his minister at the time. Pierre Fitzgibbon, they invested heavily in trying to make Quebec a hub for electric vehicle battery manufacturing and announced a series of major investments. Government invested hundreds of millions

dollars to lure a Swedish battery maker, Northfold to Quebec. Flash forward 18 months, Northfold goes bankrupt. The whole idea of the factory goes downhill. So all of these satellite factories that had been announced are all up in the air now, too. So that sense that his whole economic focus and his whole economic strategy, you know, left a lot of his decision-making in doubt. And there's also a bunch of controversies too, right? Yeah, the biggest one was this massive cost overrun of an IT program at the provincial public auto insurance board.

You know, it went on for a number of years without the government intervening. and we just held a public inquiry into that whole fiasco, which has been, you know, incredibly damaging to the government. So damaging, in fact, that Mr. Lago's former deputy premier and transportation minister who had been overseeing this provincial auto insurance board and now she was quitting politics. And she had been, you know, a year ago, you would have said that Genv Jév Gibo was a top candidate to succeed Mr. Lago,

if ever he left. So that was another factor. And then the health care reform, again, suggestion of a government that is flip-flopping doesn't know what it's doing. Yeah, yeah. So let's talk about the identity politics as well because the government also increasingly focused on identity and religion in the province with legislation banning public employees and positions of authority from wearing religious symbols on the job. I think many people will know about that. And also there's a bill that would limit public prayer.

What did this focus do for the party? Well, you have to recognize that Bill 21, which was the original bill to ban religious symbols in the public sector for persons in a position of authority was a compromise. When the Parts Quebecois was in power briefly between 2012 and 2014, they proposed a much broader ban to the whole public sector that would have covered every public sector worker with their so-called. charter of values. That bill never got passed because the Patskhebakwa lost the 2014 election, but that was the outcome of a long debate in Quebec about separation of church and state and the sense that the public sector had to be absolutely neutral in all respects. A solid majority of Francophone voters supports this kind of legislation. You know, he has used nationalist issues to solidify the nationalist base of his party to keep it from, you know,

going back to the Parti Quebec. And that has been done through characterizing federal immigration policies as a threat to Quebec, through constantly focusing on this issue of Quebec is different. We have to protect who we are. And this is the way we live in Quebec, you know, suggesting that those who don't like it can go elsewhere. He hasn't openly said that, but he has talked about, you know, immigration as being an existential threat to Quebec, that if we accept too many immigrants, Quebec will become like Louisiana. And that's, you know, a melting pot society that has lost its French character except as a folklore aspect. Yeah, that's definitely a divisive language for sure. But of course, there was also some pushback, right?

Because Lago had to use the notwithstanding clause to push those legislation through, right? Yeah, well, the Charter of Rights is clear about freedom of religion. And so the Supreme Court will begin in March hearing this case again to determine whether there should be limits on the notwithstanding clause that there are some rights that are deemed too important to violate. Yes, there is a division in Quebec strongly between urban Quebec, non-Frankophones, and Quebec outside of Montreal. Part of it goes motivation to form the CAQ in 2011, you know, we talked about this third way, was to move away from a focus on Quebec's place in Canada, right, and to bridge the sovereignst, federalist divide in the province. What's the general feeling about separation right now in Quebec?

Well, the polls are pretty consistent. About 35% of Quebecers say they would support sovereignty in a referendum. That sounds like a lot, no? Well, it's a solid base, but it's not enough for a party to. put Quebec through another divisive referendum campaign. I live through the 1995 campaign here. It's very divisive for families, for workplaces. You know, it's hard to avoid. Are you federalist? Are you sovereigns? And, you know, the 1998 Supreme Court ruling on Quebec sovereignty or on secession of any province made it clear that the federal government would not be able to

negotiate the secession of any province unless a clear. clear majority voted yes to separate on a clear question. So that is a very high bar. The Supreme Court did not say what threshold would be necessary, but most of people assume that a clear majority is more than 50% plus one. The important fact to remember here is that in the year leading up to the 1995 of referendum, polls also showed only between 35% and 40% supporting sovereignty. and in the end, 49.42% ended up voting yes. Okay. And the sovereigntists are only looking at for 50% plus one

because they believe that would give them the moral authority and under international law to claim Quebec independence. We'll be right back. So Conrad, Quebec is headed for a provincial election in the fall. Let's talk about the current political landscape there. Can you give me a sense of what those polls are saying? Well, the polls have the Patskhebek while leading consistently somewhere between 30 and 35%. The liberals astonishingly resilient given the fact that they are coming back from a historic defeat in 2022.

They're around 20 to 25%. And then you've got the Quebec Conservative Party, ironically or surprisingly, in third place. And that's largely a function of a lot of CAC voters looking for a kind of right of center alternative to the CAC. And it's around 15%, but heavily concentrated in the Quebec City region. And then you've got the CAC in Quebec Solidale somewhere between 10 and 12% or 15% for the CAC at the highest level. So you've got a political spectrum that is heavily divided and very fluid because the Pazza, Quebec was kind of a default. alternative for nationalists who are unhappy with the CAQ and its leader Paul Saint-Pierre Plamandon led the party in the last election but he was not a contender in the last election so there

wasn't a lot of focus on the party so it's going to be a very fluid situation because you've got Paul Saint-Pier-Lamando an untested leader and we're going to have two new leaders in the Quebec Liberal Party and the CAAC. Okay and where are the liberals what's happening with them? So the liberals historically are the default choice of non-sovereign to Quebec, of federalists, and immigrants to Quebec who become Canadian citizens, obviously, who are closely tied to their Canadian identity. So that gives it a solid base of between 20 and 25% of the electorate, concentrated in Montreal and a bid in Western Quebec. So the question is, the liberals need to build a coalition of federalism. and soft nationalist voters.

And so they are in flux right now because they hadn't had a full-time leader since the 2018 election. And so they elected a new leader in June, Pablo Rodriguez, former heritage minister in Ottawa. Unfortunately, his reign proved historically short. Six months,

He was engrossed in a funding scandal for his campaign. Mr. Rodriguez is not personally being accused of anything, but a lot of his organizers and donators appear to have engaged or alleged to have engaged in unethical practices. And so Mr. Rodriguez was marred by weeks and weeks of headlines of one detail after another, of really, really questionable behavior on the part of some of the visiting organizers and supporters. And in December, he resigned, thrusting the party back into another leadership race.

At first, it looked like it might be a contest, but progressively all of the possible candidates have all said they're not going to run, leaving Charles Miliar, who's a former head of the Quebec Chamber, Federation of Chamber of Commerce, likely heading toward a coronation in March. Okay.

And I know we talked about the Palti Quebecois a couple of times now, but I wonder, you said they're leading in the polls. What would it mean if they retake power? Does that not mean another referendum? Well, as of right now, that's what it means. Paul Saint-Pierrelandon is adamant that a victory of the Parts-C-Capecoy in an upcoming election means a referendum within the first mandate of a PQ government

between 2026 and 2030. whether he will sustain that promise going into an election campaign or fudge or whatever or if he's adamant, you know, that's an opportunity for other parties to capitalize on that. But if Apatse Quebequa does win the next of the lives room based on that promise, you can be well assured that, you know, that whole question of sovereignty is going to suck all the oxygen out of the political space because that's all, everything in the government becomes focused on building towards that referendum. You have to throw in the wrench of Donald Trump.

I mean, who knows. Yeah, I was going to say that must be something that's really playing into the Quebec landscape in terms of politics. How does Trump factor into this? Well, absolutely, because we saw in the April election how the threat of Donald Trump undermined the block Quebec while in that campaign

as Quebecers rally to Mark Carney's liberals based on that same idea that we're facing a common threat and that Quebec needs to consolidate in relations with the rest of Canada because of the threat of losing free trade access to the United States. So that becomes an issue in Quebec politics as well. And on the provincial level, the opposition parties, the Coalition Avenir Quebec,

and the Liberal Party, if the Trump threat continues, and we have no reason to believe it's not, that is a strong argument in the favor of not holding a referendum. Just lastly, Conrad, let's end where we kind of started and talking about the KACC. And right now there's no clear successor. Is there any sense that the KAC can survive Lago's resignation?

Well, you know, I've written that there's little likelihood of that, given the dominance that Francoise Lago has played in the party and that he just incarnates everything the KAC has, was conceived to be. But that does not mean the CAQ cannot evolve under a new leader. I think they are banking on this idea that there is strong appetite in Quebec for a non-sovereignty nationalist party that bases its policies on maximizing Quebec's power within Canada without separating from Canada.

We have two leading contenders for the CAQ right now. Simon Jolain Barrett, who is a justice minister, responsible for Bill 21, responsible for the language legislation, responsible for the proposed Quebec constitution, which is in the legislature, not certain it will ever be adopted before the next election. He would represent that strong nationalist, PAC option reminiscent of the Union National.

Second candidate and surprising frontrunner, term minister, Kistin Frischet, who is now Mr. Lago's economy minister. She's a former Pekis, member of the Partsique, who quit the PQ over the charter of values, considering it went too far. She is the economy minister, so she would represent that strong focus on the economy as an option and a disposition for the CAQ. So there will be, by the looks of it, you know, pretty interesting leadership race, probably to be held in April, and that person, whoever wins, will become premier for, you know,

likely six months. So it would be premature to write off the cack, especially if the liberals are unable to make inroads in Francophone Quebec, which they desperately need to do. Conrad, thanks so much for coming on the show. Thank you. That was Conrad Yakubuski, the Globe's staff columnist in Montreal. That's it for today. I'm Sherry, Sutherland. Our producers are Madeline White, Michal Stein, and Ali Graham. Our editor is David Crosby. Adrian Chung is our senior producer, and Angela Pichenza is our executive editor. Thanks so much for listening.