OPINION
The Parti Quebecois has been in power for about a month and frankly they look like a comedy improv troupe.
They can't seem to get anything straight, and it is indeed amateur hour in Quebec City.
They had nine years to prepare for power, yet when they got it, it seems they didn’t have the slightest idea how to put the car in drive. It’s all reverse.
It’s quite stunning actually, the about-faces and flip flops.
Pauline Marois campaigned on abolishing the health tax, and that was one thing. Announcing a tax cut without telling us how to fund it is quite another.
And at the end of the day, the health tax will remain.
Promise: broken.
What about the new Finance Minister with his secret plan for retroactive taxation.
That’s not going to happen. On to plan B and C and D.
Or how about the new Natural Resources Minister announcing an end to shale gas exploration in Quebec with no consultation or study, only to be gently corrected by Marois later on.
Or the thinking of the higher education minister Pierre Duchesne suggesting that Quebec universities are not underfunded. He is supposed to be in their corner.
With friends like these, well, you know how it goes.
Or the education minister thinking teaching English in elementary schools is a bad thing, but teaching sovereignty is a good thing… Sigh.
The only saving grace is that this is a minority government. If the PQ had won a majority, it would have been truly dreadful.
An improv team for sure. Just for laughs. And it would be funny if it wasn’t so sad.
Charest's gift to the Liberals
The timing of the recent Quebec election was Jean Charest’s parting gift to the Quebec Liberals. And timing is everything because what is coming out of the Charbonneau Commission is lethal. Before an election it would have been devastating for the Liberals.
We must remember that many of the allegations are just that: allegations.
Remember Lino Zambito, the early star of the commission, has yet to face cross-examination.
But you know it and I know it. Everyone knows that the system is rotten.
There is a culture of entitlement and greed. Nudge, nudge. Wink. Wink. Money under the table, money in paper bags, money stuffed into socks.
It’s the just the way things are done here.
You would think that the former deputy premier of Quebec would have the sense not to accept 40 roses, or concert tickets from a construction contractor.
Of course in her own defence Nathalie Normandeau remarked with a straight face, “It was Celine.”
But the PQ is not lily white either. Let’s face it, the culture is ingrained. It has been around for a very long time, and the PQ will get their comeuppance as well.
This is just beginning.
The Charbonneau Commission will unveil ugly truths but hopefully things can and will change for the better.
Although history tells us we’ve tried before with other commissions of inquiry and failed.
As Bob Dylan once said, money doesn’t talk, it swears.
