Canadian by-elections, 2012

[DL]

Yes, but TMR is actually quite a small part of the riding of Mount Royal. Looking at a map, the "mount" is about two-thirds in Westmount and about one third in Outremont...the names themselves tell the story "Westmount" refers to the western slope of the mountain and "outremont" means "other-side' or "over the mountain" in French.

[RogueBeaver]

Not federally- those are all provincial ridings (and none of those are controversial ATM), and I'm well aware about Aussie ridings.

Federally: I prefer our tradition to the Aussie one.

One thing's for sure: there won't be a federal by-election to open room for a new Liberal leader.

[DL]

I think than Rogue knows than Bourassa is for Henri.

True than he forgot René-Lévesque, Duplessis, Taschereau, Johnson, Gouin and Jean-Lesage.

And Mount Royal isn't about the mount (which is in Outremont, not in Westmount--Ville-Marie!), but about the Town of Mount Royal (often called TMR in English).

There is also a Sauve riding that i assume is named after ex-Premier Paul Sauve. Nothing for Adelard Godbout or Antonio Barrette though...someday i guess we will have endure having Sherbrooke renamed "Charest" and Lac St. Jean will become "Bouchard"

[MaxQue]

I would argue than all of the Mount Royal Park and the cemetaries in the Outremont riding (not in Outremont borough, through).

Anyways, Mount Royal has three summits. Someone has a topological map to clear that issue?

Bouchard represented Jonquière, not Lac-Saint-Jean.

EDIT: Two of the three summits, including the biggest one which is ALWAYS referred as the Mount Royal, unlike the two others, are in Outremont riding (between the university and the cemetaries, in fact).

[RogueBeaver]

Speaking of Bourassa, there are still rumours swirling that Coderre will resign to run for mayor next year. Personally I'm doubtful because: a) the rules are written so that a non-established party with minimal financing will find it near-impossible to gain a foothold b) Tremblay has been fairly clear about his third-term intentions for a while. All that would do is split the federalist vote and elect Harel or the truther.

[MaxQue]

If Union Montreal is smart, they would dump Tremblay and run Coderre.
2009 was quite close and you can't expect the vote of his opponents to split almost 50-50 like the last time.

[RogueBeaver]

I'll take Tremblay. If Coderre does run then that seat falls. No Liberal seat in Quebec can be reasonably sure without the current incumbent, possibly excepting St. Leonard-St. Michel.

[MaxQue]

To end the paranthesis on municipal elections, who is right?
You must be domiciliated in Quebec since 6 months or You must be domiciliated in the city since 6 months?

[RogueBeaver]

No idea. Anyhoo, I expect the PLQ to hold Whissell's seat.

[MaxQue]

I agree, but I reserve the right of changing my mind in case there is a significant change in the political situation.

[Hatman 🍁]

I would say "Duplessis" is a rather controversial name, considering he's Canada's most fascist Premier.

I wasn't aware Burnaby-Douglas was named after Tommy. I had always assumed part of the riding had a neighbourhood or a street called Douglas.

[MaxQue]

Well, there is a Tommy Douglas neighbourhood and a Douglas Road, but they are also named about Tommy Douglas.

[RogueBeaver]

Gouin is named after Lomer but personally I've always found Paul by far the more interesting figure.

[DL]

Speaking of Bourassa, there are still rumours swirling that Coderre will resign to run for mayor next year. Personally I'm doubtful because: a) the rules are written so that a non-established party with minimal financing will find it near-impossible to gain a foothold b) Tremblay has been fairly clear about his third-term intentions for a while. All that would do is split the federalist vote and elect Harel or the truther.

FYI, Tremblay was first elected in 2001. This is currently his third term and if he runs again it will be for a fourth term. Everyone says they are running for reelection until they are not. I assume that either Coderre will challenge Tremblay for the nomination as mayoral candidate for his party, OR, Tremblay has privately signalled that he won't run again and Coderre is his hand picked successor.

[RogueBeaver]

What's with the tone? I make a typo once in a while but I'm also a lifelong Montrealer who's in tune with city politics. Coderre has no affiliations with UM and Tremblay's Liberal associations are with the PLQ in whose Cabinets he used to serve. He has connections to federal Tories as well- why do you think Dimitri Soudas got that patronage gig at the port after leaving the PMO?

That said, Tremblay doesn't have any successor on the horizon that I've heard of. It can't be an Anglophone and a fair few of his prominent senior people like Applebaum are Anglos. Denis Coderre as mayor of Montreal is quite frankly laughable. The man's a political thug whose "organizational skills" are nonexistent judging by the results he's gotten the PLC these past 2 elections.

[MaxQue]

So, LaFontaine, named about Louis-Hippolyte La Fontaine, co-prime minister of Province of Canada in the 19th century and one of the father of responsible government in Canada.

LaFontaine is a riding in Eastern Montreal, more exactly the western half of the Rivière-des-Prairies—Pointe-aux-Trembles borough, which means than it covers the former city of Rivière-des-Prairies.

That district doesn’t have much special areas, except many buildings lot and a new controversial toll bridge linking it to Laval, which shorten the Laval-North Shore/Eastern Montreal trip and a jail. The eastern half of the riding is empty, so new neighborhoods are being built there, with similar houses, like in suburban areas. There is many condos in the western half, especially near the St. Lawrence, however, some are in a bad state.

For demographical data, there is a wonderful document called Socioeconomical Files (but in French only). Here’s the link for LaFontaine: http://www.electionsquebec.qc.ca/documents/pdf/dossier-socio-economique/2006/lafontaine.pdf

So, that riding has three main demographics, which all favours the Liberals. First of all, immigrants, especially Italians. The mother tongue of the inhabitants is English for 9.3% of them, French for 43.2% of them and 47.5% have another first language, mainly Italian, but Creole and Spanish is common, too. When the language talked at home is asked, 52.7% are saying French, 26.1% are saying English and 21.1% are saying another language, in the same pattern observed for mother tongue. Finally, 32% of the population of LaFontaine is immigrants. As immigrants are one of the more Liberal-voting populations, it’s good for them.

However, even it’s an immigrant area, it’s not poor. The average annual income is 3,000$ higher than the national mean and the average median income is 6,000$ above the provincial one. 15.5% of the population has an income over 100.000$, which is in line with presence of condos and suburban developments, but also poorer parts of the riding which have older housing. People with a higher income are more likely to vote Liberal.

Politically, it’s described as a safe Liberal riding, but it wasn’t always like that. It was one of the 7 ridings which elected a PQ MNA in 1970 and one of the six in 1973, but then the riding included Pointe-aux-Trembles and Montréal-Est, which are more independantist and then, at each redistricting, it lost parts of Montréal-Est and Pointe-aux-Trembles, making it more and more Liberal. PQ finally lost in 1985 and never came close of regaining it.
 
Since 2003, its MNA was Tony Tomassi, son of Donato Tomassi, main shareholder of Genco, one of the biggest construction businesses in Quebec and big Liberal donator. In 2008, he was named Family Minister. He got into spotlight when, in early 2010, opposition accused the government of attributing the 7-dollar childcare places to projects proposed by liberal donators (that program is than it is child care for 7$/day, government is paying the balance. Since there are only a limited number of places, the places are attributed to specific child care centers).

During that scandal, it was discovered than he used a credit card given by a security company, BCIA (now bankrupt), owned by Luigi Coretti, in exchange of him convincing the Public Surety minister to give him a special weapon permit, which is downright illegal. So, on May 6, 2010, he resigned as minister and left the Liberal caucus. He didn’t came to the Assembly since then. Since then, he is prosecuted for fraud against the government and confidence abuse. He finally resigned on May 3th, after a CAQ MNA deposed a complaint to the Ethics Commissioner about his absenteeism.



So, as the situation is presented, only the candidates and the past results are missing. As of now, there are 3 candidates.

Liberals: Marc Tanguay. They wanted to run Pablo Rodriguez, Liberal MP of Honoré-Mercier from 2004 to 2011 (lost to NDP), but he declined. Marc Tanguay is the President of Quebec Liberal Party, since 2009. He is also a lawyer (at a cabinet called Delegatus). He also was Innovation Director at GE Capital. His nomination is apparently not well received by the Italian population, as he doesn’t know the area at all, as he lives in a South Shore suburb/exurb. He ran in Chambly in 2007 (south shore), then a bellweather, to replace a retiring one-term incumbent, but finished 3rd (24%), the winner being the ADQ candidate Richard Merlini.

CAQ: Domenico Cavaliere. Another lawyer, who lives in LaFontaine this time. He also was a commercialization analyst for a distillery. First time he runs for something, apparently.

QS: Julien Demers, which has no bio existing online but ran three times in Deux-Montagnes (north shore suburb), for UFP in 2003 (4th, 1.3%), QS in 2007 (5th, 2.2%) and 2008 (5th, 2.3%). He finished behind Greens because the Green leader was running there, then.



Finally, the past results since 1994.¸
September 1994
Liberals: 56%
PQ: 35%
ADQ: 8%
Others: Innovative: 0.9% (single issue, for an universal retirement system), Natural Law 0.9%, 

November 1998
Liberals: 58%
PQ: 30%
ADQ: 11%
Others: Innovative: 0.4%, PDS (the remainers of the NDP-Quebec) 0.4%

April 2003 (redistricting finally removed all of Pointe-aux-Trembles)
Liberals: 70%
PQ: 19%
ADQ: 10%
Bloc Pot : 1.2% (marijuana)

March 2007
Liberals: 62%
ADQ: 18%
PQ: 14%
Greens: 2.9%
QS: 2.1%

December 2008
Liberals: 70%
PQ: 19%
ADQ: 6.5%
Greens: 2.7%
QS: 1.9%

[MaxQue]

And the map:



The weak Liberal area in the west is a big cluster of retirement houses along Gouin Blvd (they vote Liberal, but less than Italians).

The east of riding is the new area of Pointe-aux-Prairies, near the park of the same name and in the municipal ward of the same name, halfway between Rivière-des-Prairies and Pointe-aux-Trembles, more suburban. The name was found by a kid in a competition in the local elementary schools, to mix the name of the two areas. Politically, it's a mix, too, being a swing area at all levels.

Best Liberal result is 97%.

[MaxQue]

Oh, God.

http://www.ledevoir.com/politique/quebec/349847/les-politiciens-ont-peur-de-leur-ombre

Donato Tomassi, father of Toni, gave an interview to Le Devoir, were he said perturbing things.

He says than inquiries are focused on them because they are italians and than is racism.
He says than they are rejected even if they have talent, guts and charisma like his son (?).
He says than he treated Jean Charest like a king and than it is unfair to treat like bad after he did that.
And he is saying than we want to "transfrom Quebec in a monastry, where we can't help our friends. What are the purpose of having friends if we can't help them?"

He seems to see patronage and corruption as normal. Creepy.

[Hatman 🍁]

Great stuff, Max!

[RogueBeaver]

Quebec hasn't changed that much since the late '70s on corruption issues but these days you have to at least try and keep things an open secret rather than completely public.

[MaxQue]

Another resignation in Quebec!

Line Beauchamp, Education Minister, Vice-PM, MNA for Sauvé from 1998 to 2003, MNA for Bourassa-Sauvé since 2003.

She resigns over "failure to solve the student crisis". I think more than she was disagreeing with Charest line on it or than government decided to throw her under the bus.

Also, another Vice-PM to resign in the year. Also the 4th high-profile minister to resign (not counting Béchard who resigned 3 days before his death).

[RogueBeaver]

Charest has the same Catherine wheel effect on his senior ministers that late-term Thatcher did on hers. Bellemare, Couillard, Mulcair, MGT, Normandeau... now Beauchamp.

[MaxQue]

Charest has the same Catherine wheel effect on his senior ministers that late-term Thatcher did on hers. Bellemare, Couillard, Mulcair, MGT, Normandeau... now Beauchamp.

Séguin, Dupuis...

EDIT: And we forgot the obvious one, Mulcair.

[RogueBeaver]

Interesting that Beauchamp and Coderre share the same territory.

[MaxQue]

Interesting that Beauchamp and Coderre share the same territory.

Well, Coderre's riding is equivalent to Tomassi and Beauchamp ones.