Welcome to the Election Writ, a special-edition newsletter to get you up-to-date on the ongoing campaign in Quebec.
Premier Christine Fréchette kicked off Quebec’s election campaign last Thursday, giving her 39 days — the longest campaign allowed by law — to turn things around for her Coalition Avenir Québec, a party that was doomed to electoral catastrophe when she took over from former premier François Legault earlier this year.
Already, her chances to pull off an upset look decent. But as soon as the CAQ got itself somewhat off the mat under Fréchette, this Quebec election was always going to be a tough one to call.
LIVESTREAM STARTING TONIGHT AT 9 PM ET
There are three federal byelections being held today in the ridings of Beaches—East York, Chicoutimi—Le Fjord and North Vancouver—Capilano. Philippe J. Fournier and I will be livestreaming the results beginning at 9 PM ET / 6 PM PT.
There are five parties in contention to win seats across the province. The Parti Québécois is leading in the polls, particularly among francophone voters, and remains the favourite to win the most seats (for now). The Liberals have a core of concentrated support on the island of Montreal and a few other regions of the province, giving them a very high floor. But their lack of support among francophones also gives them a very low ceiling.
The Conservatives, after being shutout in the last election, now have enough support in the Quebec City region that they should be able to take advantage of the divided electorate and win some seats. If they do, it’ll be the first time a provincial Conservative has been elected under that banner since the 1930s.
The left-wing Québec Solidaire also has enough concentrated support in central Montreal to ensure a few seat wins of their own. But, like the Conservatives, the party’s lack of support outside of its core region limits its potential ceiling.
And then there is the CAQ. Somewhat like the PQ, the party has a broad base of generally-uniform support in francophone Quebec. This means that when the party was doing badly in the polls, it was projected to lose nearly all of its seats across the province. When the party was doing a bit better, but not good enough to really put any pressure on the PQ, it was projected to lose a lot of seats by small margins — coming up short in riding after riding.
But now that the party is back in contention (or is it? more on that below), the CAQ is running neck-and-neck with the PQ in much of Quebec. The uniform support that both parties generally have means that they are contesting a huge number of seats, and whoever ends up doing marginally better than the other could reap the electoral benefits.
Also in today’s newsletter: A new poll from Synopsis Recherche reset the narrative last week. Plus, we take a tour through the Eastern Townships, one of Quebec’s most electorally-divided regions.
The projections in the Quebec Election Tracker show what this phenomenon produces. The model has the Parti Québécois leading in 63 seats, with the CAQ leading in just 14. But the upper band for the CAQ stretches to 54 seats, while the lower band for the PQ drops to 29 seats. The gap between the low and high projected ranges for the two parties is about 40 seats. By comparison, the ranges for the Liberals, Conservatives and QS are all 10 seats or fewer.
For that reason, the average result from the model’s 10,000 simulations — which takes into account the number of toss-up races and historical under- or over-performance of parties compared to the polls — for the three other parties are not dissimilar from the number of seats in which they are each projected to be leading.
The Liberals are projected to be leading in 34 seats and win an average of 33.6 seats in the simulations. The Conservatives lead in nine seats and win an average of 7.8, while QS leads in seven seats and wins an average of six.
The PQ, however, wins an average of only 50.1 seats, well below the majority threshold. That’s because they are projected to be the leading party in nearly all of the toss-up races in which they are in contention. The odds that they win nearly all of the toss-ups are low. The beneficiary is the CAQ, which wins an average of 29.5 seats. A bunch of the toss-ups in which the CAQ is trailing are bound to fall that party’s way — particularly when we consider how the CAQ’s support is far higher among older voters, who are more likely to vote.
So, just how many toss-ups are there in the model — and who is fighting for them?