The Parti Québécois organizes a meeting with a community that does not vote for it, a community naturally distant from the sovereigntist movement but that could, under the right conditions, listen.
A room is booked. A team travels. Documents are printed. Microphones are installed. A date is confirmed. Invitations go out.
The invitations go out to party members.
The evening of the meeting, the targeted community is almost absent. The chairs are occupied by people who already know each other, who share the same convictions, who arrived convinced and will leave convinced, which is useful for many things, but not for reaching a community that was not in the room.
The meeting starts anyway. People talk about sovereignty, about the national project, about history, about the importance of the moment. The room listens with the attention of those who do not need to be convinced.
Then a question arrives. Not about the idea. About the moment. About inflation, the cost of living, security, what people feel in their wallets today. About Gen Z, politically engaged but absent from this movement.
Someone stands up.
You sound like Liberals.
The meeting ends. The team packs up. The room empties.
In March 2026, the PQ is at 31% in the polls, down for three consecutive months. Support for sovereignty sits at 29%. The lowest since 1995.
The next meeting is already scheduled.
No one new came in.
Note: This text is an aggregate of real situations observed during recent meetings with members of the Parti Québécois. The scenes are merged for the purposes of the article. No quote is attributed to any identifiable person.
