Quebec Conservatives offer two-for-one deal on party memberships

Quebec Conservative Party (PCQ) Leader Éric Duhaime is launching a promotion to attract Coalition Avenir Québec (CAQ) supporters who voted for leadership candidate Bernard Drainville: Buy a one-year membership, and get the second year free.

“Several CAQ supporters have approached me in recent days. They’ve come to the same conclusion I did a few years ago, namely that the CAQ no longer embodies the autonomist right,” Duhaime wrote on social media.

He asserts that the 42 per cent of CAQ members who supported Drainville in the party’s leadership race voted for more private health care, downsizing the government, lowering taxes, or greater autonomy for Quebec within Canada — ideas Duhaime says are championed by the PCQ.

“I say to you: you are welcome,” he insisted.

The Conservative leader has publicly courted CAQ members in the past, with former minister Maïté Blanchette Vézina joining the party a few weeks ago.

Christine Fréchette was elected leader of the Coalition Avenir Québec on Sunday with 57.9 per cent of the members’ vote; Drainville was believed to be more closely aligned with the conservative nationalist camp.

‘To all nationalists’

On Monday, the Parti Québécois (PQ) also started courting Drainville’s supporters, posting an advertising campaign in several media outlets, including La Presse, Le Devoir and the Journal de Montréal.

“At the Parti Québécois, we are firmly convinced that Quebecers deserve to make their own choices freely, whether it be for their language and culture, how they live together, or the sound management of public finances,” the ad stated, adding, “Nationalists, welcome home.”

In his congratulatory message to Fréchette, PQ Leader Paul St-Pierre Plamondon wrote that Drainville’s defeat marked “the defeat of the ‘blue’ nationalist faction in favour of CAQ members who align more closely with the party’s ‘red’ school of thought.”

He also described Drainville’s leadership campaign as “courageous.”

This report by The Canadian Press was first published in French on April 15, 2026.