The hype over Quebec Premier Francois Legault’s resignation is mystifying to say the least. Despite what many commentators are suggesting,[i] his departure is unlikely to change anything in terms of the outcome of the next provincial election, let alone break the whole contest wide open. With or without Legault, it is still highly unlikely the CAQ will even finish in second place, let alone form another government.
Why? Because, despite wishful thinking on the part of media looking for a major story, it would take a miracle for the CAQ to accomplish the same extraordinary feat as the federal Liberals with their ‘come-from-20-points behind’ election victory over the Poilievre Conservatives in April 2025. And miracles, like lightning, rarely strike twice. The CAQ’s current situation is nothing like that of the Carney Liberals, and it has no chance of getting there.
To begin with, the CAQ is not only 23 points behind the PQ (who lead the polls at 34%) but finds itself in fourth place (at 11%), far behind the second-place Quebec Liberals (24%), and even the third-place provincial Conservatives (16%). Contrast this with the situation of the Carney Liberals. They were always in second place, and they were able to vault ahead of the Conservatives due to the total collapse of the NDP vote, which migrated to the Liberals. In the current situation the CAQ support has likely reached rock bottom but, if not, it is the CAQ vote that will collapse and move either to the Liberals or the Conservatives. No Liberal or PQ vote will bleed to the CAQ.
In addition, as with any first-past-the-post (FPTP) electoral system, distribution matters, and some parties have more efficient vote distribution than others. In the last provincial election in 2022 this was particularly significant, due to the presence of two fringe parties who siphoned votes from the major contenders. In that previous election the CAQ won 76 seats, a massive legislative majority, with 41% of the popular vote. But the Liberals placed second and formed the Official Opposition with 14% of the vote and 27 seats. Meanwhile the left-leaning Quebec Solidaire fringe party, which today is in second-last place behind even the CAQ and is not considered a factor in the upcoming fall election, received 15% of the vote and 11 seats. Similarly the PQ, with 14% of the vote, obtained only 3 seats, while the Conservatives, with 13%, elected no one.
As the numbers demonstrate, it is always better in a FPTP system to have a concentrated vote in specific ridings than to have weak but broad support across an entire electoral area. (This, of course, is the longstanding fate of the NDP federally.) According to Canada 338, if a provincial election were held today the PQ would form a majority government of 76 seats, the same as the CAQ last time, but with only 34% of the popular vote as compared with the 41% the CAQ received. Similarly, the Liberals at 24% would obtain 37 seats, as compared with the 27 seats they received last time with 17% of the vote, while the CAQ at 11% would be shut out.[ii] Put another way, both the PQ and Liberal support appear to be considerably more efficient than that of the CAQ while the Conservatives’ support is far too diffuse to matter.
But while the distribution of support is important, there are far more significant factors explaining the dramatic rise of the PQ and the Liberals in the polls since the 2022 election, which needless to say was brought about by the dramatic decline in support for the governing CAQ and the widespread unpopularity of its leader, Premier Legault.
As an earlier article on this site outlined in some detail [iii], there are several reasons for the precipitous decline in support for the CAQ over the last two years. Simply put, the wheels came off both Legault’s economic agenda and his nationalist agenda. The failure of his right-wing business plan to live up to expectations was matched by the failure of his plan to usurp PQ separatist support and unify Quebecers by promoting a nationalist agenda within the Canadian federation.
These failures were catastrophic for the party and the premier for the obvious reason that this new party has in effect lost its raison d’etre. Legault, a well-known Quebec businessman and former PQ minister, had founded the CAQ less than a decade earlier to break the decades-long template of Quebec elections as a contest between separatists and federalists, thereby allowing voters for the first time in decades to prioritize more typical concerns on the right/left spectrum. This was a seismic shift in the way Quebec provincial politics operated. In this context the CAQ’s (and Legault’s) image of economic credibility and stability, along with the claim that separation was neither feasible nor desirable, but Quebec nationalism could be championed within the existing system, was a winning combination.
For a while it seemed to work, but the Legault government’s string of economic missteps were soon matched by increasingly desperate efforts to stem rising support for the PQ, efforts that, in the end, succeeded in polarizing rather than unifying the general public and raising the temperature on Quebec nationalism. In fact, the more Legault sensed that he and the party were in trouble, the more he headed off in the wrong direction to try and resurrect his fortunes. In particular, despite polling that demonstrated the majority of Quebecers have no interest in separation, or a referendum on that outdated notion, he seemed to believe that this was his principal problem and persisted in introducing more and more extreme measures to combat this separatist red herring. The direct consequences of the failed economic and nationalist policies was that his party’s support fell to an unheard of 11% and the premier himself to an unprecedented 75% disapproval rating.[iv] Moreover by 2024, less than two years after the last election, articles began appearing with headlines such as “The beginning of the end for Quebec Premier Francois Legault?”[v]
The immediate result of this disastrous CAQ record was to drive many voters to consider where they would turn in the next election, and in the short term the PQ appeared to represent the only serious option. This was particularly ironic since it was not the party’s separatist agenda, or the popularity of leader Paul St-Pierre Plamondon, that attracted them. In fact, in his initial stages as leader Plamondon was a drag on party support. But increasingly anxious voters considered the PQ’s right-wing business agenda under Plamondon to be a credible alternative to that of Legault.
The growing popularity of the PQ was also aided by the ongoing disarray of the only other traditional party to have formed a government, the Quebec Liberals. Like the PQ, they had picked a lacklustre candidate when in opposition, in their case after the defeat of the Couillard Liberal government. But, unlike Plamondon, Dominique Anglade was never able to put her party on a credible footing and they languished in the polls for several years. However, with the selection of well-known former federal Liberal cabinet minister Pablo Rodriquez as the new Liberal leader in early 2025, voters began to look more closely at the Liberals as a viable alternative, and that party’s fortunes began to rise substantially and quickly. By the fall of 2025 they were within 8 points of the PQ and appeared poised to mount a serious challenge in the next election.
Which brings us to the current situation, one dominated by leadership issues. First and foremost, there is the CAQ’s need to replace Legault. This is an all but impossible task, since Legault not only founded the party but is literally synonymous with it. And since the CAQ was based on the concept of some sort of ‘third way’ option, it lacks the coherent ideological foundation required of a real and lasting political party, making it difficult to even know what type of leader they are looking for. Far from being likely to perform a near-death recovery in the next election, something some commentators still appear to consider a real possibility, the party is actually in an existential crisis. Put another way, the question to be asked at this point is not who should succeed Legault, but whether the CAQ can survive as a political party.
Meanwhile the provincial Liberals are also in the throes of a leadership race, the second in less than a year. Accusations of impropriety on the part of Rodriguez’ supporters in the Liberal leadership race could not be put to rest despite his best efforts, and in the end he was left with no choice but to resign in late December. This has now opened up another leadership race in the party, a situation which could have been seen as a major problem so close to the next provincial election.
However the almost certain winner of that Liberal race, Charles Milliard, is quite likely the worst nightmare of both Plamondon and whoever succeeds Legault. Milliard, who finished a close second to Rodriquez on the second ballot of the last leadership race, is a well-known Quebec businessman, a pharmaceutical executive who headed the Quebec Federation of Chambers of Commerce, someone who can easily convey the image of economic competence and stability that Legault sought to project and that Plamondon temporarily appears to be benefiting from. And unlike Rodriquez, the first Hispanic leader of a political party in Quebec, Milliard is also a native of the Quebec City region, stronghold of the PQ, and someone with far better communications skills and personable image than St-Pierre Plamondon. Indeed, Plamondon’s frequent off-the-cuff remarks in recent months have caused considerable difficulty for his party, including his most recent tirade aimed at federal Heritage Minister Mark Miller and the Quebec cultural community.[vi]
Quite apart from this tale of duelling leaders, there is also the issue of the PQ platform on separation, which is frankly incomprehensible in light of public opinion. Polls have consistently shown that support for Quebec separatism is at its lowest level since the 1970’s, with some 65% of Quebecers opposed to separation and to any referendum being held on that issue. Despite this, Plamondon has not only promised to hold a referendum after taking power, but has repeatedly doubled down on that commitment when concerns have been raised.[vii]
In short, the smart money should be on the Quebec Liberals to gain support in the coming months, primarily at the expense of the PQ, and quite possibly to come out on top in the next provincial election. Meanwhile the CAQ is finished as a political entity, as are the two fringe parties, and Quebec politics is likely to return to the traditional Liberal/PQ contest so familiar for the past six decades.
[i] See for example pollster David Coletto’s comments on InFocus January 14, “How Could Legault’s Exit Change the Race in Quebec?” or Andrew Coyne on CBC’s At Issue panel, January 15.
[ii] https://338canada.com/quebec/
[iii] https://brookejeffrey.ca/legaults-constitution-gambit-more-wrong-headed-desperation/
[iv] https://338canada.com/quebec/
[v] https://thehub.ca/2024/01/17/the-beginning-of-the-end-for-quebec-premier-francois-legault-and-the-mighty-caq/
[vi] https://www.ctvnews.ca/montreal/article/part-of-the-cultural-community-lacks-loyalty-to-quebec-says-pq-leader/
[vii] https://globalnews.ca/news/11488486/pq-insists-quebec-needs-referendum/
