M. Dumont brings his act to Toronto

Chantal Hébert
Toronto Star September 23, 2002

FOR THE best part of three decades, Canadian audiences have had an simple way to tell Quebec political leaders apart. They were either sovereignists or federalists. And, in all cases, they were very much men on a mission to move their cause forward in the rest of Canada.

But those familiar markers will be of little use today when Action démocratique du Québec leader Mario Dumont makes a rare appearance in front of a Toronto business audience.

The 32-year-old Dumont sees neither a new deal for Quebec within Canada nor sovereignty for the province as an end in itself.

If one or the other ever came his way and inspired a large consensus among Quebecers, he might well reach out for it.

In his decade in politics, Dumont has, in turn, promoted a Meech-style accommodation with the rest of Canada and, when that failed, Quebec sovereignty.

A Dumont government would not give its formal assent to the 1982 Canadian Constitution. Nor does the ADQ leader support the federal Clarity Act on Quebec secession.

But as the rising star of Quebec politics, Dumont is not primarily seeking a Canadian audience receptive to formal constitutional change. He is not ready to commit a fraction of the energy of his predecessors to that particular file.

In Quebec, the ADQ leader has basically been promoting the notion that a nationalist is, first and foremost, someone who wants what is best for Quebec rather than someone who has necessarily found it in either federalism or sovereignty.

To the dismay of the two traditional parties, it is a proposition that has seduced francophone voters, providing them with a way to break out of the post-referendum box without making a definitive choice.

For the better part of a year now, Dumont has been turning Quebec politics on its head, springing from a distant third place in voting intentions last January to a strong lead in a recent string of end-of-summer polls.

The phenomenal rise of his party has upset the calculations of federalist strategists. They had always imagined that Liberal leader Jean Charest — their strongest champion in the referendum — would eventually seal their fragile 1995 victory by ousting the Parti Québécois from power.

But the ADQ is wreaking even greater havoc among sovereignist thinkers who fear that Dumont might be on his way to displacing the PQ as the party of choice of francophone Quebec.

As impressive as Dumont's climb up the political ladder has been, his impact on the Quebec political debate is even more remarkable.

For the first time in decades, the next election will not revolve around the issue of the province's political status.

Instead, it will focus on the central role of the Quebec government, a role that Dumont is determined to curtail sharply.

Not since the Quiet Revolution of 1960 have Quebecers been called upon to revisit as central a tenet of their political credo.

No one should presume what their ultimate answer will be.

If an election were held tomorrow, polls show that Dumont might lead his party to a majority government.

But if Premier Bernard Landry had got his act together over the summer and called an election for October or November, the ADQ would have been hard-pressed to sustain its lead.

Dumont was really no more ready to do battle this fall than then-Canadian Alliance leader Stockwell Day in the summer of 2000.

He has yet, for instance, to come up with a slate of candidates solid enough to confirm that his party is ready for prime time.

Recruiting political stars with proven track records is easier said than done when one expects them to defend policies such as a flat income tax scheme, an end to Quebec's popular $5-a-day universal daycare program, the phasing-out of the ironclad job security of the provincial public service, as well as the privatization of some parts of the health-care system.

With Landry ruling out an election until the spring, Dumont now has the benefit of a few more months to cobble a winning campaign together.

But when the election call does come, his platform will be a main focus of the debate. Each and every one of its planks will be scrutinized for structural weaknesses.

Despite Dumont's strong connection to Quebec voters — he has been party leader longer than the competition and still his popularity endures — it could well be that, even with the benefit of six to nine extra months, his fledging party will not manage to rise to the occasion.

That should deter no one from paying attention to his maiden out-of-province speech.

If Dumont turns out not to have spoken as the next premier of Quebec in Toronto today, chances are he will have done so as a future one.

Chantal Hébert is a national affairs writer. Her column appears Monday, Wednesday and Friday. She can be reached at chebert@thestar.ca.