French Kiss: Stephen Harper’s Blind Date with Quebec

Chantal Hébert’s first book is both a post-mortem of the Canadian federation that died on January 23, 2006, the night of the last federal election, as well as a brilliant examination of our changing political future, one that involves living with Quebec rather than just wooing it.rnrnOn that night, award-winning political writer and broadcaster Chantal Hébert stood in a Calgary convention hall with 2,000 Alberta Conservatives, who were raucously cheering the election of ten Tory MPs from Quebec. The Conservatives would not have gotten their man in office without Quebec, and now the future success of the Harper government hinges on turning this one-night stand into a long-term relationship.rnrnMore than ten years ago, the Quebec-Alberta coalition cobbled together by Brian Mulroney dissolved, leading to the births of the Bloc Québecois and the Reform Party. As a result, Alberta and Quebec took their marbles out of federal play, and Ontario got to run Canada.