For four years, Parti Québécois Leader Paul St-Pierre Plamondon (PSPP) sharpened the spear of Quebec sovereignty. He told Quebecers the province was ready for a defining national moment. But when the election finally arrived, he left the spear in the tent.

After winning only three seats and not even 15 per cent of the vote in the 2022 Quebec election, many thought that PSPP was only a transitional PQ leader. However, not only did he stay on, but he worked consistently to put independence at the forefront of his agenda. That steady work paid off. At its peak, the party led the polls, reaching 38 per cent support, according to aggregator qc125.com in last December, 16 points ahead of their closest opponent.

But, ahead of Tuesday’s election debate, that lead is now slipping through his fingers. What looked like a certain majority government a few months ago has become a much more uncertain position.

In the lead-up to the election, PSPP has favored a big tent approach. While PQ leaders in the 21st century have been ideologically more left of centre, PSPP has been focusing his agenda on putting Quebec independence first and foremost, similar to what Lucien Bouchard and Jacques Parizeau did in the 1990s. For that, he knew he had to build a vast coalition of nationalists and bring more right-of-centre voters into the party’s coalition. In the years before the election, he has adopted policies that align with this line of thinking. From advocating for stricter immigration to denouncing wokeism , PSPP has pushed the party beyond the centre-left comfort zone it has occupied the last quarter century.

A staunch separatist, he has never shied away from defending his proposal to hold a referendum on Quebec independence in the first term of a PQ government. He was avoiding a critical mistake multiple PQ leaders have made in the past in moving away from their core raison d’être. PSPP’s immediate predecessor Jean-François Lisée pledged not to hold a referendum if elected. He won only 10 seats in 2018 and was forced to resign afterwards. In the 2012 election, former premier Pauline Marois pledged to hold a referendum only in a second term. All polls suggested that she was on track for a majority government, but on election day, she was held to a minority.

Bernard Landry followed a similar path in 2002. Elected on a sovereigntist mandate in 1998 with Bouchard, the PQ government spent years pursuing “winning conditions” rather than holding a third referendum many supporters expected. Landry, who took over the leadership before the end of the PQ’s term, proposed a 1,000-day timetable. He never came close to reaching it, losing power in 2003. Taken together, when PQ leaders allow sovereignty to become an afterthought, when it is their founding purpose, the base and core supporters tend to stay home.

And now, history appears to be rhyming once again.

PSPP spent four years convincing Quebecers that the province was ready for a rendezvous with history. However, right before the election campaign began, he argued that Quebec should wait until U.S. President Donald Trump leaves office before deciding its future. What he told Quebecers is that he does not believe in his own project enough to risk an election on it.

One can understand the temptation. On the campaign trail, voters are worried about Trump and the trade war. PSPP likely concluded that talking less about sovereignty when voters are looking for reassurance and stability would strengthen his chances of forming government. But great national projects have never been built on caution alone.

The very idea of independence rests on the belief that a people can determine its own future despite whatever happens in the world. If a movement keeps waiting on the perfect conditions, these conditions will never arrive. There is never going to be a perfect timing. Voters can make the case that if the PQ is not willing to hold a referendum until Trump is gone, then they won’t vote for the PQ until Trump is gone. Nations cannot schedule history around U.S. elections.
Now that Trump has become a key issue of this election, and Coalition Avenir Québec leader and premier Christine Fréchette is driving a narrative that Quebecers need stability to face the trade dispute. PSPP has effectively played into Fréchette’s hands. Instead of doubling down early in the campaign and convincing voters that sovereignty was the way forward, he said in his own words that Fréchette’s approach is right and we need stability.

While the PQ leader is now complaining that Trump sucks up all the space in the campaign, he is the one who changed his referendum timeline because of the U.S. president. The irony is difficult to miss.

Facing declining support in the polls and on the sovereignty question itself, PSPP chose caution over conviction. PSPP’s personal numbers have been affected. In the last Pallas Data poll, his unfavorable rating has reached an all-time high of 55 per cent. Only 15 per cent of people have a neutral opinion of the PQ leader, giving him limited room to expand support. He is now sitting at 29 per cent compared to 23 per cent for the CAQ and 22 per cent for the Liberals in the the QC125 average. Despite an edge of nine points over the CAQ among francophone voters, it is not enough for the to win the majority government it once coveted.

Since becoming PQ leader, PSPP built his brand every day on being transparent and ideologically consistent. It was refreshing to see in a political landscape full of carefully managed scripted politicians. Unfortunately for him, at the first real test he faced, he undermined the very brand that brought him so high in the polls. For four years, PSPP told Quebecers history was knocking at the door. And when the moment finally arrived, he did not answer.

National Post

Marc-Olivier Fortin is the former national Vice-President of the Conservative Party of Canada (2016-2018) and campaign manager for the CPC in Quebec (2021). He is now a regular commentator at RDI and on COGECO radio and works for Transfert, a firm specialized in social acceptability in mining, energy and heavy industry sectors.

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King Charles III will be on Canada’s new $20 banknote, unveiled just days before the fourth anniversary of the death of Queen Elizabeth II. Next February, the notes will enter circulation, and Canadian republicans will have to seethe and stare into the face of the sovereign as they withdraw cash.

Instead of spending months recovering from the sight, they might try to explain how abolishing the monarchy would make Canada a better country. We already have a (nominally) accountable government, political independence, and a firm constitutional order that is not threatened by turnover in government.

Canadian republicans want to replace something demonstrably Canadian with something they think is more modern and “inclusive,” at least in theory. Their soiled explanation is that the Crown is somehow opposed to democracy or an impediment to Canadian autonomy. That flies in the face of Canadian history, which has produced a very robust democratic culture and political system under the Crown, not outside it.

Electing the head of state is not an evolution, but a choice, and one that is unlikely to be made by any Canadian government in the near future or perhaps even the far future. It is not as if abolishing the monarchy would complete some sort of silly fantasy of democratic maturity.

Look at the existing monarchies in the West, and what do you find? There are Australia, Britain, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, New Zealand, the Netherlands, Norway, and Sweden. All of these parliamentary monarchies rank among the world’s freest and most stable countries. Their records of democratic endurance speak for themselves. They are not awkward outliers from some simplistic theory in which republicanism represents progress.

Russia and Iran are republics, and nearly all of Africa is as well. Every South American state is a republic, every one of them has “no kings,” yet the continent has hardly anything to brag about when it comes to democracy or stability. They are breathing rebuttals to the idea that becoming a republic is itself an accomplishment.

There is great value in keeping the country’s highest constitutional office away from ugly electoral mudslinging. There is no need to add another partisan contest to divide Canadians and make them bitter. We need only do that as much as is necessary. The prime minister should not embody Canada, and the Westminster system is very good at keeping the office of head of state away from ambitious politicians who dislike restraints on their power.

There is cultural continuity in Canada’s Crown too. A grandfather and grandson can recognize the same Crown — and, in Elizabeth II’s time, the same monarch — without voting for the same political party. These public symbols are shared across living generations and with generations now gone. Such political and cultural common ground is valuable, and countries are better off when they can offer more of it without attaching it to the latest election campaign.

The arguments for the Crown as a centrepiece of our constitutional arrangements are well established, as is its relationship to the military. Nonetheless, many of the monarchy’s critics accuse it of reminding Canadians that their country was once a colony of the British Empire. How can that possibly be a mark against us?

Being connected to a wider civilization that spread the English language, parliamentary ideals, bourgeois habits, forks, and flush toilets across the world is something to be proud of. To be embarrassed by that is the preserve of idiots and those with an axe to grind.

We are not another country’s property because we share a history and a monarchy with Britain. King Charles III is the King of Canada, and that is constitutionally and politically ironclad. We have the independence to govern ourselves, and trying to completely sandblast the country’s past and identity is not a mark of maturity, but of pimply adolescent rage.

Anglo-Canada is half of the historic and still-living core of Canada, and the English-speaking society from which much of the country’s political culture, military traditions, and customs emerged. Recognizing that does not erase French Canada or anybody else, nor is Canada more admirable when Anglo-Canada is diminished.

Apart from marking four years since Queen Elizabeth II’s death, this September is also the anniversary of Canada’s entry into the Second World War. Our army was predominantly drawn from English-speaking Canada, which understood itself to be British North American and expected newcomers to become part of that society. Tens of thousands fell in defence of democracy as Canadians knew it then and know it now, under a King and a parliamentary system, against the Nazis.

Whoever observes Remembrance Day to honour those dead while cheering the disappearance of the culture of the fallen should give their head a shake.

Besides, that same culture continues to defy expectations that newcomers will reject it. Last year, a survey from Pollara Strategic Insights found support for retaining the monarchy at 46 per cent among immigrants and 44 per cent among Canadian-born respondents. Is this the demographic destiny that republicans so eagerly wish for?

The idea that newcomers will find the monarchy incomprehensible says far more about the speaker than the newcomer, and the notion that the Canadian republican movement is powerful is laughable. A 2022 vote in the House of Commons rejected a motion to sever ties with the Crown by a vote of 266 to 44, with both Liberals and Conservatives voting together to crush it.

Obnoxiously bashing royalty is far easier than building a movement to alter the Constitution. Republicans cannot point to a single democratic freedom that we lack because of the King. They have no grassroots movement of any meaningful influence, and their most high-profile ally was former federal NDP leader Jagmeet Singh, a glaring failure of a politician.

The quest for a puritan, “liberal democratic” society shorn of all pre-modern character and callbacks to our past is no more than bugmen racing to the bottom of a cave.

If Canadian democracy needs any fixes, it does not apply to the King, long may he reign.

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This weekend, the Wall Street Journal reported that Prime Minister Mark Carney is pushing for associate membership with the European Union in an effort to diversify Canada away from the United States. Though, on Sunday evening Carney downplayed the story, and said he is seeking a “unique alliance” with the EU. It’s a convenient dodge in any case as both terms are undefined in any legal sense and Canadians deserve to know what the Prime Minister is actually up to.

While there are solid economic and security reasons to pursue greater integration with Europe, it is far from clear that these are the only forces driving the government. One senior Canadian official was quoted by the Journal as saying “Canadians, we sound like Americans, we dress like Americans, but as a society we’re much more European.”

That is reflective of an elite and out of touch attitude which may sound good in urban Toronto, Montreal and Vancouver, but which does not reflect the reality of most Canadians and could end up seriously harming them.

Elements under discussion between Canada and the EU reportedly include “ways to let Canada’s goods, services and workers involved in strategic supply chains such as energy, AI, defense and critical minerals move freely” and “laying underwater cables, jointly constructing data centers, cloud storage and new satellite networks and infrastructure to ship Canadian energy to the EU.”

While not all of those items may be desirable, some unequivocally are. On the negative side of the ledger would almost certainly be the free flow of workers between Canada and the EU. We have seen this play out in Europe before, notably in the United Kingdom. The simple reality is that more people in Europe (and the world) speak English as a second language than vice-versa. That affects the direction of travel of the workers. On pure linguistic grounds alone, it is nearly certain that Canada, as a primarily English-speaking nation, would be opening its workers up to far more competition from English speaking Europeans, than, say, Greek or German workers would face from Greek or German speaking Canadians. Any politician who avoids the difficulty of that question alone is in for a massive shock when push comes to shove. A “free flow” of people and workers goes both ways and isn’t an unalloyed good for Canadians.

However, the idea of Canada acting as a close and trusted European partner to host data centres and export energy to Europe is a fantastic one. How much oil and gas does Europe want from Canada? Whatever the answer, start building the pipelines to supply it tomorrow and then build five more. This is as much of an economic no-brainer as any country is likely to find.

Europe needs reliable gas that doesn’t come from Russia and Canada has enormous gas reserves. A more ideal partnership is hard to imagine, excepting of course the niggling problem that we can’t get the gas to our east coast in large quantities because the pipelines aren’t there.

Also of importance, and hidden behind the Wall Street Journal’s reporting, are the serious problems related related to any EU deal in general. Notably, given our recent blow up with the United States over our trading relationship, is the issue of sovereignty. Much about what exactly went wrong in that negotiation remains unclear, but Canadians were told by both the prime minister and chief trade negotiator Janice Charette that the United States sought provisions which would be “constraining or limiting (to) Canada’s ability to enter into future free trade agreements.” That threat to our sovereignty was unacceptable so Canada walked away. If true, we were right do so.

However, the notion that an EU association, or “unique alliance,” would not come with similar or analogous restrictions on Canada’s sovereignty is pure fantasy. The European Union negotiates trade deals on behalf of the bloc of member countries. Individual countries are not permitted to unilaterally enter into trade deals on their own. That is to say, they sacrifice a piece of their sovereignty for the large negotiating power which comes from the 27 member countries acting together. Further, the EU does not even allow Norway, not an EU member but a member of the European Economic Area (a type of EU association), to negotiate trade deals that allow backdoor entry to the EU.

That is to say, Norway’s sovereignty is limited beyond what would be expected in a typical trade agreement, despite not being an EU member, just as Canada’s could be, depending on exactly what is being pursued. To believe that this country will somehow be given a free ride and can keep doing just as we please if we enter the close cooperation apparently being discussed, is to conveniently ignore the harsher realities of European integration.

Further worrying is the lens Canada seems to be putting on European association, with a senior official telling the Wall Street Journal that “as a society we’re much more European.”

It is hard to imagine a more out of touch comment being made by any negotiator. I have no doubt that many highly educated members of Canada’s elite wish to think of themselves as Europeans, perhaps they even live as though they are. The vast majority of Canadians, however, do not.

In our current situation it may not be comfortable to recognize that we share far more with Americans than any other country, but that is our reality. I say this as someone who lived and studied in Europe for years and speaks French, Spanish and German. Indeed, there’s every reason to think close EU association might be very beneficial to me personally. So, can believing the unnamed senior official be superficially appealing? Sure. Is it reflective of the reality of most Canadians? No, and it never will be.

If Prime Minster Carney can position Canada as the European energy and critical mineral supplier of choice, this is unequivocally something he should do. In that area there is real fit and synergies to be found. However, anyone who believes that Canada’s natural home is Europe and that EU association won’t come with limits on our deeply cherished sovereignty, needs to step out of their faculty lounge or book club echo chambers to understand the reality of our country and how what is being proposed is likely to affect a majority of Canadians.

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It’s a tough time to be a federal Tory. The polls are demoralizing. Some MPs are quitting and some are going rogue. And the worse things get for Canada, the more voters seem to support the Liberals. As Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre prepares for a caucus retreat this week, Brian Lilley speaks with Ian Brodie, former chief of staff to Stephen Harper, and Ginny Roth, who helped run Poilievre’s leadership campaign. They offer their ideas on how Poilievre can reposition himself in this weird, new era of jingoistic anti-American nationalism that Prime Minister Mark Carney has boosted into a winning brand. And, just as importantly, how he can reinvigorate his party and reassert the control he once commanded over his caucus — before his problems get bigger. (Recorded Sept. 10, 2026.)

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Canada’s trade war with the United States is escalating as Canadian counter tariffs have taken effect and the Americans have widened the scope of their own tariffs. It’s unclear whether this might lead to further escalation or whether there’s a path back to the negotiating table. It’s also not clear what the government’s ultimate objective is or how long they’re prepared to fight this battle. In this interview, National Post’s Rob Breakenridge speaks with Carleton University business professor Ian Lee about the need for Canadians to accept some of the basic economic realities we’re facing and the potential economic damage from a prolonged trade war. If we’re not careful, Lee warns that we could stumble into a recession or even see capital flight out of the country.

The word “female” is so objectionable to our federal government that it cannot even be used in a court case involving women being sexually abused in prison.

“Cisgender woman” is the preferred term used by the Canadian government allegedly for reasons of “clarity and accuracy.”

Cisgender woman, as opposed to female, is used “to refer to individuals whose gender identity corresponds to the gender assigned to them at birth based on observed sexual characteristics,” says the government in a recent statement of defence.”

It adds that the “use of the term ‘female’ to refer solely to cisgender women risks mischaracterizing or misgendering gender diverse inmates, and this Defence avoids that usage for clarity and accuracy.”

Having erased female as a category, is it any wonder that the government goes on to argue that putting biological males into women’s prisons is fine as long as they identify as women?

Further, the government insists that if the women inmates — the biological females — are sexually assaulted by the “gender diverse” prisoners — the biological men — that it is not a breach of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

This is not just madness, it is unhinged, demented and dangerous lunacy.

Last year, Reem Alsalem, the UN special rapporteur on violence against women and girls, wrote a report condemning gender ideology because it was deleting women from society.

“The erosion of women and sex specific language, the conflation of sex, gender and gender identity” was weakening protection for mothers, women and girls, she said in a speech before producing her report.

She might have added that it has weakened protection for female prisoners in Canada.

Only in Canada can we have a judge saying bike lanes are protected by the Charter but the federal government arguing that women at risk of being sexually abused in prison aren’t.

“Canada’s accommodation of the needs of gender diverse inmates does not infringe the rights guaranteed to cisgender women under the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms or the Canadian Bill of Rights,” says the statement of defence.

“Everyone has the right to life, liberty and security of the person,” says Section 7 of the Charter, but that doesn’t apply to female inmates, according to our Liberal government.

The government was forced to file a defence after the Justice Centre for Constitutional Freedoms (JCCF) helped launch a lawsuit challenging the Correctional Service of Canada’s policy of allowing “trans-identifying male inmates” to be housed in women’s prisons. The policy “exposes female inmates to physical and psychological harm and violates their Charter rights,” argues the JCCF.

“The lawsuit claims that this practice is cruel and unusual punishment and violates the Charter rights of female inmates, including their right to be protected from mental, physical, and sexual abuse,” the JCCF says in a statement .

The lawsuit was filed last year on behalf of the Canadian Women’s Sex-Based Rights (CAWSBAR), a coalition working to preserve the rights and protections of women and girls.

The lawsuit “references an extensive list of physical and psychological harms female inmates have suffered as a result of being forcibly confined with trans-identifying male prisoners, including sexual assaults, sexual harassment, beatings, stalking, and grooming,” says the JCCF statement.

An attempt by the federal government to kick out the claim was denied by the federal court in May this year.

This month the government filed its defence and remarkably, as the JCCF noted in another statement , “the federal government confirmed that complaints by female inmates against trans-identifying male inmates have resulted in sexual-assault charges.”

Still, this does not deter the Canadian government from trying to wash its hands clean.

“To the extent that state conduct may have caused a deprivation of the life, liberty, or security of the person of cisgender inmates, which it is not admitted, any deprivation is consistent with the principles of fundamental justice under section 7 of the Charter,” argues the government.

The government goes on to say that if any of the women’s Charter rights were violated “any such breach is justified under section 1 of the Charter as a reasonable limit demonstrably justified in a free and democratic society.”

In other words: if women were hurt, tough luck.

In the JCCF statement, constitutional lawyer Chris Fleury is quoted as saying, “The government’s Defence shows that female inmates have made serious complaints about what has happened to them in women’s prisons, including complaints that resulted in sexual-assault charges.

“Female inmates are being exposed to real risks and real harm. This case is about protecting their safety, dignity, and constitutional rights.”

While the government’s defence casually dismisses the rights of women prisoners, it makes sure to strictly adhere to the correct gender terminology.

“The term ‘gender diverse’ is an umbrella term for gender identities or gender expressions that differ from dominant cultural or societal expectations based on sex assigned at birth, and encompasses all gender identities, including transgender, non-binary, and two-spirit,” says the defence before adding, “the term gender diverse offender or inmate will be used throughout this Defence.”

The very next paragraph explains why the word female is now effectively outlawed.

We have known for a while that women were being sacrificed on the altar of gender ideology. Now we know that our own government actively supports such an obscene policy.

National Post

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When I first heard Boy George’s new song, We Will Dance Again, I was in my car driving back from yet another meeting about security and rising antisemitism in Canada. As the senior rabbi of one of the largest Jewish congregations in Canada, I estimate 30 per cent of my time is spent combating Jew hate and protecting the physical and emotional safety of my community.

The song speaks plainly about October 7, the hostages, Israel’s right to defend itself and the selective memory that erases Jewish suffering. It opens with a clear moral distinction, “You say genocide, I say war / When you’re attacked, that’s what the army’s for / Does it get ugly? You bet it does / When I know you wanna kill / Every last one of us.”

I had to pull over. I played the song, first released on his X feed, twice because I couldn’t believe my ears were hearing what my soul had been yearning for.

In fact, it was almost as if he anticipated my astonishment. “If you’re ever confused,” he sang, “I stand with the Jews / I don’t feel brave, I just need to behave like a human”

Sadly, some among my own Jewish people have been unwilling to take so clear a position of solidarity.

As he has done throughout his career, Boy George spoke the plain, unvarnished truth as he saw it, social convention be damned, and he set it to a snappy reggae tune you can dance to.

Boy George has a complicated past. He faced appropriate consequences and has spoken openly about his mistakes. That history should not be erased, but more than three decades as a rabbi have taught me that human beings are more than the worst chapter(s) of their lives.

Parked on the side of the road, I found an email address for his management and wrote him a letter I never thought he’d answer. But I wrote it anyway. I am a man of faith, after all.

I told him I wanted to hug him, but that the hug would not be only from me, it would be from thousands of Jews and our allies who have been waiting nearly three years to hear such words from someone with his reach and influence.

Two weeks later, he walked into my synagogue, and I gave him that hug.

I have listened to Boy George since I was a teenager dancing to Culture Club at youth group parties and even my prom. I never imagined that one day I would welcome him to the pulpit of Temple Sholom in Vancouver, before nearly 800 allies and members of our Jewish community.

We learned that evening that the song was inspired by George’s visit to the Nova music festival exhibition in London, England. He told us with clear emotion in his voice that as a singer and DJ who has performed at festivals around the world, he recognized that world. He walked into the exhibit with its carefully preserved dance space, colourful tents, tapestries and abandoned belongings and it was as though he was in his own home that had been violated. He saw the photographs of young people murdered for the crime of dancing. He met survivors and the parents of Jake Marlowe, a British man murdered on October 7. He promised one survivor that he would write a song.

One Friday night, sitting at home, he did. He released the first version without consulting his manager because, as he told us, “I didn’t want to be told not to do it.”

Most public figures employ people precisely to tell them what not to do. They calculate the market, anticipate the backlash and sand down every dangerous edge until they say nothing, or at least nothing anyone could possibly find objectionable.

While recording the final version, he told us, he burst into tears.

The backlash was immediate. George was denounced and threatened with boycotts. Activists demanded that Vancouver’s Pacific National Exhibition cancel his scheduled concert.

Then something remarkable happened.

The Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs and the Jewish Federation of British Columbia, led by Ezra Shanken, organized a letter-writing campaign. More than 10,000 people urged the PNE to stand by George and allow the concert to proceed.

The PNE did.

That decision deserves recognition. In the three years since October 7, too many arts institutions, particularly here in British Columbia, have backed down before bullies and called their cowardice prudence. They invoke “safety,” “sensitivity,” or “community harmony.” The language is polished, but the lesson is dangerous: create enough anger and you will be given a veto.

The PNE refused to teach that lesson.

Courage is contagious. George stood his ground. Thousands of Canadians stood with him. The PNE kept the stage open.

George then made another important choice. He did not perform “We Will Dance Again” at the PNE.

He understood that the audience, of which I was a part, had come to a summer concert to sing, dance and enjoy the music. They had not consented to attend a political rally.

He respected them enough not to hold them captive to his politics.

Performers such as Macklemore and Kneecap have turned concerts into platforms for hostile, one-sided political propaganda, forcing audiences who came for music to become participants in their causes.

George had every opportunity to answer his critics from the PNE stage. He chose instead to give the audience the concert they had purchased tickets to see.

Two nights later, he came to Temple Sholom, where the purpose was different and everyone knew why we had gathered.

There he spoke openly about the song, the threats and the Jewish friends and strangers who had written to thank him. Then, in a synagogue filled with people who understood its meaning, he performed “We Will Dance Again” live for the first time.

That night, I watched people cry, smile and rise to dance. In the days that followed, messages have poured in calling the evening magical, joyful and unforgettable.

Their gratitude revealed how lonely many Canadian Jews have felt.

When it was over, I gave Boy George the hug I promised him, and presented him with a shofar, the biblical ram’s horn blown to wake us from our slumber and call us to action. Officially, it was presented on behalf of the Jewish community of British Columbia, but as I said in the moment, truthfully it was on behalf of Jews and our allies everywhere.

Courage is contagious. May other artists catch it and appear at a synagogue, Jewish community centre or public forum near you. We need more artists like George to stop being confused and stand with the Jews against those who seek to terrorize and destroy us. Every rabbi I know has an extra shofar in the office. Come and get one. It will come with a hug.

Rabbi Dan Moskovitz (@rabbidanmosk) is the Senior Rabbi of Temple Sholom in Vancouver.

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