PQ renews efforts to woo minority voters: Can it pay off by 2018?

Our interview wrapped up on a Sunday afternoon five hours before bullets flew through the Islamic Cultural Centre in Quebec City.

I'd beeninMontreal for an exclusive interview with the Parti Qubcois leader's new special advisor ondiversity, velyne Abitbol, along withPQ MNA Carole Poirier, the party's spokeswomanon immigration and diversity issues.

Little did any of us know that the topic of our conversation the PQ's desire tobuild bridges with minority communities would end up at the heart of the discussion in this province in the aftermath of the Jan. 29mass shooting.

Six Muslim men were killed in their mosque, just after evening prayers.

Historically, the majority of what former PQ premier Jacques Parizeau infamously called the"ethnic vote" cast by both anglophones and allophones has gone to the Liberals.

With the PQ'straditional voting bloc of white, French-speaking Quebecersin demographic decline, those ethnic votes could make or breakthe Parti Qubcois in the next election, scheduled for October 2018.

Leader Jean-Francois Lise brought Abitbol on board to try to grapple with that reality.

Moroccan-born Abitbol, who ran unsuccessfully for the PQ in Acadie in 2014,has decades of experience with international, governmental and non-governmental organizationsand a Rolodex full of names and numbers of people inMontreal's various ethnic communities.

"I want to build bridges, but I want to bring people [from] both sides. We have to meet in the middle of the bridge," saidAbitbol, who isthe co-founder the Raif Badawi Foundation for Freedom.

She understands that means addressing obstacles to successful integration that affect new, second- and third-generation Quebecers, issues such asemployment and housing discrimination, French-language training for newcomersand recognition of foreign credentials.

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'Listening tour'

The day after last month's mosque attack, PQ MNAs fanned out across Montrealon a"listening tour" that had already been organized by Abitbol.

The tour included 45 activities involving 11 linguistic and ethnic communities, including groups representing anglophones, North Africans, Kurdsand Haitians.

Poirier saidfor some of her caucus colleagues, especially those from ruralridings, these encounters with what she calls "the Montreal reality" would prove to be an eye-opening experience.

"Some know it well, some less well," she said.

"It's a dialogue that we want to establish, in a frank and honest way, and above all, with an openness from all my PQ colleagues," she said, adding that they're buildingon the work of Maka Kotto, the Cameroonian-bornPQ MNA for Bourget.

Abitbol says eventually she would even like to pair up MNAs with different minority groups or associations, in order to strengthen their links over the long term.

Before vs.after shooting

The PQ's outreach strategy is in stark contrast to the identity politics that was front and centre of the debateduring the PQ's recent hotly contested leadership campaign.

Then came the mosque shooting.

In the days after the attack, discussion centred on the need for members of the province's political elite to check theirtone when it comes to immigrants, and Muslims, in particular.

Two weeks after the shooting, CBC offered the PQ an opportunity to talk about what had happened and what impact the devastating event would have on its approach to ethnic minorities.

The party declined the invitation.

"We will not add anything," a party spokesperson wrote.

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However, it is already clear that the party has, at least, tweaked thatapproach.

And it started at the top, with a mea culpa from leader Jean-Franois Lise.

Liseadmitted a few days after the shooting that his statement to Le Devoir newspaper last Septemberduring the leadership race,"We've seenAK-47's under burkas in Africa," went over the line.

"The rhetoric has to be toned down on every side of the debate," Lise told Daybreak's Mike Finnerty on Jan.31.

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The PQ's secularism critic, Agns Maltais, also acknowledged the new environment.

In the fall, during a committee hearing onthe province's religious neutrality bill, Maltaisdeclared that she would refuse service froma civil servant wearing an overtly religious symbol.

She said her position was rooted in the fact that as a lesbian, she is uncomfortable with how religions have historically treated homosexuals.

But when I asked Maltaisa week after the shooting whether she would still say the same thing in public, she shook her head.

"At this time, I would not repeat that," she said.

Lise and the party released a 20-point plan for successful integration of immigrants a week after the attack.

It includes measures to fight employment and housing discrimination and to speed up the recognition process for those with foreign credentials.

Still hurdles ahead

So, will the new tone paired with more on-the-ground outreach to minorities pay off in 2018?

Hurdles exist.

During our interview before the shooting, Abitbol said she believed the PQ could get past the legacy of the divisive debate over the party's so-calledcharter of values Bill 60,which died on the order paper before the 2014 election.

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"I think the charter of valuesis in the past," she said.

But the shooting thrust the issueback to the surface. On Facebook, the man charged in the six mosque deaths,AlexandreBisonnette, wrote thathe feared immigration would marginalize the white race.

The nature of the shooting targeting Muslim people in a mosque and the suspect's anti-Muslim views inevitably ledto a renewed discussion about theintegration of minorities in Quebec society.

Some people, including the governing Liberals, reminded the world that the PQ's failed charter made minorities feel targeted, particularly Muslim women. A CBC-Ekos polls carried out in 2013 found that most people believe the charter fostered anti-Muslim sentiment.

The party's youth wing also put the charter debate back in the spotlightlast weekend

Members debated a motion tabled by PQ youth from the Laurentians calling on the party to revive the ban on religious symbols for public sector employees.

After a heated debate, the motion was rejected,only garnering15 votes in its favour.

However, the issue dominated coverage of the meeting in the lead-up to Sunday's vote. It also showed that the charter is not buried as far in the past as some in the party would like it to be.

Bill 62

The current PQ position on religious symbols could also be problematic in wooing minorities.

The PQ, Coalition Avenir Qubec and Qubec Solidaire share the stance thatthe Liberal government's religious neutrality legislation, Bill 62, does not go far enough.

If passed, the bill would ban anyone from providing or receiving public services with a face covered by religious garb, such as aburqa or niqab.

The opposition wants Bill 62to include one of the high-profile recommendations of the 2008 Bouchard-Taylor Commission report: that civil servants in enforcement positions, such as police, Crown prosecutors, prison guardsand judges be prohibited from wearing any overt religious symbols.

But recent rejection of thatrecommendationby one of the commissioners, philosopher Charles Taylor, hobbles the part of the PQ's argument that relied on the "consensus" position of the Bouchard-Taylor report.

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Finally, words can hurt.

Even though the PQ leader says he and his team are watching their tone moving forward, it does not erase the past. Or at least, the past does not erase so easily.

As Abitbol says, a positiveground game focused on improving livingconditions fornew Quebecers and their families is crucial if the PQ wants to make real inroads.

"So they all feel included in the Quebec we all love," she told me on the afternoon of Jan. 29.

Little did she knowhow important those wordswould be, only hours later.