{"id":567576,"date":"2026-03-29T00:16:08","date_gmt":"2026-03-29T00:16:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/567576\/"},"modified":"2026-03-29T00:16:08","modified_gmt":"2026-03-29T00:16:08","slug":"andre-pratte-why-im-returning-to-quebec-politics-at-a-crucial-time","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/567576\/","title":{"rendered":"Andr\u00e9 Pratte: Why I\u2019m returning to Quebec politics at a \u2018crucial\u2019 time"},"content":{"rendered":"

Andr\u00e9 Pratte, the veteran journalist, is returning to a senior role inside the Quebec Liberal Party at what he tells The Gazette is a \u201ccrucial\u201d moment for the province\u2019s future.<\/p>\n

The 68-year-old will once again chair the party\u2019s National Political Commission, which he describes as effectively its internal think-tank ahead of an election expected this fall. He chaired the Commission from 2023 until 2025 before leaving for professional reasons.<\/p>\n

The party has since seen a period of upheaval: leadership turmoil at the very top, following the scandal and then resignation of Pablo Rodriguez as party leader over financing allegations, along with turnover in other positions.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve resolved my professional issues, and I was available to come back,\u201d Pratte said in a phone interview Saturday. \u201cI am convinced that the next election will be crucial for Quebec\u2019s history, and I want to be involved and try to be helpful in any way.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI firmly believe that the next election will be historically important for Quebec and Canada, and that Quebec needs a liberal and a federalist government in the current circumstances.\u201d<\/p>\n

When Pratte, who once served as editor-in-chief of La Presse and has written columns for The Gazette, previously stepped down from the Commission, he was replaced by former minister Martin Coiteux, who held the post briefly. Antoine Dionne-Charest later served as interim chair, while Charles Milliard was acclaimed leader in February.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe new leader, people like him.\u201d<\/p>\n

Pratte will oversee the policy commission\u2019s work feeding into the party\u2019s electoral platform. He says this is an urgent task. <\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re making a platform for the next election,\u201d he said, noting the 30-something members on the committee met for the first time Saturday morning. \u201cPeople are very positive. The new leader, people like him. They find him authentic. And so I think the opportunity is there.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWe don\u2019t have that much time,\u201d he added. \u201cBut we\u2019re working hard so that we can not only have a good leader and good candidates, which I\u2019m sure we\u2019ll have, but also have a platform that addresses Quebecers\u2019 concerns.\u201d<\/p>\n

A L\u00e9ger poll earlier this month suggested the Liberals had edged to within a single point of the Parti Qu\u00e9b\u00e9cois, whose charismatic leader continues to advocate for a referendum on independence, which remains broadly unpopular with voters, according to recent polling.<\/p>\n

Pratte\u2019s role, he said, would be to act as a bridge between Liberal party members and leadership, and help translate concerns into policy.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe responsibility that we have is really to address Quebecers\u2019 real, concrete problems today, starting with the cost of living and housing shortage.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe prices of houses, condos, and apartments are extremely high. So that\u2019s, I think, most Quebecers\u2019 priorities. We have to address that on the platform,\u201d he said, adding public services are also not working as they should.<\/p>\n

\u201cPeople in Quebec pay high taxes, and they expect that, in return for those taxes, they get services from the government that work, and that\u2019s not the case currently. So again, we have to arrive with proposed solutions to those problems that are both practical and affordable, because the fiscal situation of the current government is not good.\u201d<\/p>\n

The party is expected to begin outlining parts of its platform in early summer, he said, though Pratte added voters would not see the full picture until the campaign itself.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think it\u2019s too early to say. We have a general meeting planned for sometime in June,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe may get some indications at that time, but we don\u2019t want to unveil our whole platform five months before the election. We\u2019ll keep at least parts of it for the campaign itself.\u201d<\/p>\n

Do you have a story tip? Write to me at hnorth@postmedia.com<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\"Profile<\/a><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t\t\tI cover the biggest stories I can find in Montreal and beyond (plus sometimes tennis). Thinking about new formats to tell those stories for different audiences is always on my mind. I studied economics and computer science at McGill. I drink coffee everywhere. Write to me at hnorth@postmedia.com.\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Andr\u00e9 Pratte, the veteran journalist, is returning to a senior role inside the Quebec Liberal Party at what…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":567577,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[22],"tags":[49,48,295,92296,120789,197017,16622,66],"class_list":{"0":"post-567576","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-environment","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-environment","11":"tag-news-videos","12":"tag-quebec-elections","13":"tag-quebec-liberal-party","14":"tag-quebec-politics","15":"tag-science"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/567576","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=567576"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/567576\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/567577"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=567576"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=567576"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=567576"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}