Why Qubec Solidaire's merger with Option Nationale might not pay off

Aside from one less partylisted on the ballot when Quebecers go to the polls in October 2018, the merger of Qubec Solidaire and Option Nationale is unlikely to have any wider electoral significance.

At least not directly.

Option Nationale, a centre-left sovereignist party founded by former MNA Jean-Martin Aussant in 2011, has not had much success in the two elections it has contested.

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Option Nationalecaptured just 1.9 per cent of the vote in 2012 and failed to win a seat not evenAussant's. In 2014 under Sol Zanetti, the party'ssupport dropped to just 0.7 per cent.

The party is rarely included in polls anymore, but the last surveythat did list the party as an option did not record enough support to give Option Nationaleeven oneper cent.

Qubec Solidaire, by comparison, is a behemoth. The left-wing sovereignist party took 7.6 per cent of the vote in 2014, enough to win it three seats. The latest polls putQubec Solidaire's support atbetween 12 and 18 per cent, which could deliver the partya few more seats on the island of Montreal in 2018.

Little direct electoral impact

So the electoral benefits of this merger which still hasto be approved by the members of the two parties appear to be very slim. If every single Option Nationale vote had instead gone to QubecSolidaire in 2012 and 2014, Qubec Solidaire would not have won another seat.

Option Nationale's electoral showings have been getting worse.

In seven byelections held since 2016 (with the exception of the vote in Gouin, where the PartiQubcois did not present a candidate so as to ease the way for one of Qubec Solidaire's new co-spokespeople, Gabriel Nadeau-Dubois), OptionNationalehas taken less than 1 per cent of the vote.

Its latest performance in the Louis-Hbert byelection on Monday was its worst yet. With 0.3 per cent, OptionNationaleplaced ninth out of 10 candidates.

The Parti Qubcois, however,could have made better use of OptionNationale's support in past elections in ridings that it narrowly lost.

It could have won two more ridings in 2014 with the help of OptionNationale's voters and five more in 2012, putting it just four seats short of a majority government that year.

Chasing the sovereignist vote

But Qubec Solidaire may not be looking to hoover up OptionNationale's votes as much as its sovereignist bonafides.

Option Nationale was founded because Aussant did not feel the PQ was moving quickly enough towardsovereignty. Merging with it may go some way in persuadingsovereignist voters that QubecSolidaireis their best option, particularly in the context of PQ Leader Jean-Franois Lise's promisenot to hold a referendum on Quebec independence in the first mandate of a PQ government.

Further splitting the shrinking pie of sovereignist voters will hurt the Parti Qubcois, which is already struggling in the polls. But for Qubec Solidaire, it could be the ticket for increasing its share of seats in the National Assembly and perhaps one day overtaking the PQ.

Chasing away the progressive vote?

There is a risk for Qubec Solidaire in this strategy.

QubecSolidairehas cornered the left-wing vote in the province, so much so that it has taken up the space that might have been occupied by progressivefederalist parties such as the reborn NPD-Qubec, which ran a candidate in the Louis-Hbert byelection.

This was the first time the New Democrats have presented a candidate provincially in more thantwo decades. Though the party took just 1.4 per cent of the vote, thatwas more than five times as many ballots as earned by Option Nationale.

By emphasizing independence in its merger with an explicitly sovereignist party,Qubec Solidaire is in danger of turning off federalist progressive voters who have not had other alternatives on the ballot in the past.

It is unlikely that the New Democrats will be able to storm onto the provincial scene anytime soon.

Theymay yet fail to get on theirfeet in time for next year's election and present a full slate of candidates. But with this merger, QubecSolidairecould have more votes to lose thanto gain.

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