Tom Mulcair: A Laurentian mayor may be a harbinger of a Liberal breakthrough in rural Quebec

Liberal Leader Mark Carney takes part in a television interview with Radio-Canada in Montreal on April 3, 2025. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Mathieu Catafard, Pool

Tom Mulcair is a former leader of the federal New Democratic Party of Canada between 2012 and 2017, and a columnist for CTVNews.ca.

The Bloc Québécois had expected to easily win a new riding in the Laurentians North of Montreal. The ‘Carney effect’ is being felt even in those parts of the province where the Liberals haven’t won a seat in years.

Tim Watchorn is the mayor of the beautiful Laurentian village of Morin Heights. This is my neck of the woods and Tim is very much a Laurentians guy. His family’s been ‘up north’ since the 1800s. Vintage pictures of the area often feature his family’s farm.

He was chosen town councillor twice before being elected mayor four times. He has his community tattooed on his heart.

There is a new federal riding in the area called Pays-d’en-Haut, which is a reference for the lands north of Montreal where colonists were encouraged to settle by the legendary Roman Catholic priest Curé Labelle.

The new riding is tentacular, spreading from the Ontario border to First Nations communities north of Joliette. It includes large swaths of Quebec’s rural heartland.

This is Bloc Quebecois country. So much so that even though the Bloc candidate, lawyer Ariane Charbonneau, was parachuted in from Montreal, she was expected to win in a romp. That was before the madness of King Trump upended everything.

Transposing the 2021 votes onto the new riding would’ve given the Bloc nearly 50 per cent, with the Liberals receiving a mere 25 per cent.

All that has changed.

Support for separatism ‘in freefall’

Last weekend, I was in the neighbourhood of Tim Watchorn’s campaign office and decided to stop by. It was 9 a.m. on a Sunday and the locale was full of volunteers with Watchorn front and center.

The weather was lousy so instead of door knocking they were getting set for a day of phone calling. Their enthusiasm was palpable, their optimism easy to understand.

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The trifecta of Trudeau’s departure, Trump’s folly and Carney’s arrival have completely changed the political landscape in Quebec.

Support for separatism is in freefall, the Liberals are 20 per cent ahead of the Bloc.

Carney performs well in French

Naysayers have tried to take potshots at Carney’s supposedly weak French. On Thursday night, he took part in a 35-minute live televised discussion, all in French, of course, with three seasoned veterans from Radio-Canada.

Carney nailed it.

They weren’t doing him any favours and he faced tough questions. Carney was natural, handled the questions with aplomb and showed the good-natured side of himself that saw him do so well in an earlier appearance on American television. He was self-deprecating and gave himself a six out of 10 for his spoken French, which he predicted, with a smile, he could get up to an eight or a nine before the end of his first term.

What may ease Carney’s mind and make him smile even more is a recent Nanos survey that found 38 per cent of Canadians feel the next prime minister must be able to work in French, but don’t need strong French language skills. One-fifth, or 21 per cent, don’t care at all about French language skills in their next leader.

I knew Carney’s French was fine, but it had become a thing with separatist pundits. A few years ago, I’d invited Carney to speak with my class of graduate students at l’université de Montréal. The topic was sustainable development, a subject he knows like the back of his hand. No one had the slightest problem understanding his French and the students really appreciated his deep knowledge.

He did so well during his television appearance Thursday that it will predictably take some of the pressure off of him for the French leaders’ debate. It also introduced him to a very large Quebec audience (as well as to Francophones outside of Quebec) who see much hope in a man they know little about.

Carney stated that every thing that had changed overnight after Trump’s tarif announcements. He was right.

But a lot has also changed on the domestic front.

Quebecers are no different than other Canadians when it comes to dealing with the crisis provoked by Trump. In fact, the openness expressed by Legault for new west- east pipelines and for tackling interprovincial trade barriers has been a welcome sea-change for federalists here.

On election night, keep an eye out for Les Pays-d’en-Haut. If the Liberals, and Tim Watchorn, do pull off a win, it could signal a huge seat count for Carney and a major place at the table for Quebec in the new government.