Parti communiste du Québec: An interview with Secrétaire national Adrien Welsh

The PCQ is running 10 candidates in the October 5 election.

Image via the Parti communiste du Québec on Facebook

With an election program titled "Pour le travail, la démocratie et le socialisme", the Parti communiste du Québec is fielding 10 candidates in the upcoming provincial election being held on October 5. This is the first time it has fielded candidates independently of the Québec solidaire coalition since 1998.

The Left Chapter (TLC) asked Parti communiste du Québec Secrétaire national Adrien Welsh (AW) -- who is also running for election in Sainte-Marie–Saint-Jacques -- some questions about the campaign and its objectives.

(The responses have been lightly edited for length and clarity)

TLC: This is the first time that that the party has run candidates in a provincial election since 1998. Why is the party running candidates now? What has changed in the political situation in the province?

AW: If we want to be totally accurate, the Party did run candidates since 1998 provincially. However, we would do so under the ticket of Union des forces progressistes which, eventually, became Québec solidaire. That's because - despite QS' propension to hide this fact - its creation emanates from three progressive parties (Parti communiste du Québec, PCQ; Rassemblement pour l'action politique, RAP; Parti de la démocratie socialiste, PDS) [that] decided to join forces in order to build what could look like a coalition of progressive forces who share one goal, that of curbing the power of big business.

As communists, we tried to maintain that unity and that spirit until Québec solidaire {was no longer} a party of rupture with monopolies, but rather a party that accompanies them and their power. The ultimate red line was crossed in December 2017. At that point, QS agreed to merge with Option Nationale (a small group of Québec nationalists)...to show itself as a party integrated to big business power. From there on, beyond the national question, QS tried to be a Québec version of the NDP, that is, not precisely a mouthiece of monopolies, but rather a party that accompanies big businesses as opposed to one that fights for a rupture against monopolies.

Many examples showcase that shift. For instance, the original platform of UFP called for Canada to get out of Free Trade Agreements - which are nothing else than Free Exploitation Agreements or corporate constitution tailored for big business. In the same order of ideas, struggling against NATO - US is out of the picture. Actually, Ruba Ghazal, QS co-Spokesperson said, after the January 3rd kidnapping of Nicolas Maduro, that had this operation been approved by the UN, QS would have been in favour of it. More surprisingly, QS doesn't call anymore for free education, but rather for a "gradual" free education in the post-secondary system. That's what the Liberals under Jean Lesage used to call for. We know how it ended up... We could also talk about their housing plan: it calls to cap rent increases to inflation. Seriously? When in Montréal alone, housing price rose by 71% percent? Why not rolling them back? They claim to gain 5 billions of dollars by instituting

a 1% tax for those who earn 25 millions and 2% for those who earn 100 millions. Seriously? Can't we do better? Can't we nationalise and bring under public and democratic control big businesses? Can't we double the corporate taxes or tax by 100% all capital gain (not just in terms of housing speculation, but overall)?

Québec solidaire is not only trying to prove to capital that it can manage it in a responsible manner. It is also putting together demands that, knowing it won't form the government, could be accepted by the proxies of monopoly capital.

In these conditions, we deem it impossible to work with those who not only betray "the left" by abandoning the struggle and the centrality of the fight between labour and capital, but who also create a vacuum for the most reactionary forces (Duhaime's Parti conservateur du Québec) to become an actual legitimate political force.

TLC: What are the key platform and policy points that the party want to raise during the campaign and what is the focus of the campaign?

AW: Conversely to bourgeois parties, we do not run a campaign based on a platform, but rather on 5 struggle perspectives and 5 points of rupture with monopolies. We do not want to promise this or that...measure, instead, we promote the struggle. If a communist is elected, its main value will be to stand in the way of capital, to dynamise the working class and democratic struggles and, through them, answer to people’s need. For that reason, our campaign is based on the 5 following points which go beyond the campaign itself since we...established them at our National Congress in May 2024, meaning that elected or not, we will keep struggling for these immediate demands after the election as much as we have done so before and during.

1. Valuing Labour, not Capital – expand union rights including the right to strike, raise wages and roll-back prices of necessary goods;

2. A planned economy according to workers’ needs – key industries and natural resources under public and democratic control, build 100% public social housing;

3. A public monopoly on public services – no more PPPs, no more private role in education and healthcare;

4. A democratic and internationalist solution to the national question – for a sovereign Québec within a democratic Canada that is anti-imperialist, close the Québec Bureau in Tel-Aviv and reopen the one in Havana, Québec must use its diplomatic posts to be a voice of peace, not a mouthpiece of US imperialism;

5. Expand democratic rights – hate speech is a criminal activity, fight for wage equity, for mixed-member proportional voting system and give more democratic power to municipalities so that they don’t have to rely on private investment to balance budgets and can be a key player in the fight against monopolies.

We believe these axis of struggle respond to the most immediate concerns of the working class and the popular masses. Obviously, these will not lead to socialism, which is our end goal. However, they will help gathering the forces necessary to build socialism. That’s why we believe that voting for the Communist Party is not a « rejection » vote, but rather a vote that will help build the forces – and perhpas the coalition – that will curb monopoly power and that will contribute to fight US imperialism instead of negotiating with it.

TLC: What kind of impact on the broader political discourse is the party hoping to have? How do you think the party's message will rise above the noise of "mainstream" neo-liberal politics?

AW: Obviously, we will take the time to analyse this aspect of our campaign once we are out of it. However, what we can say so far, is that this campaign contributed to anchor the Parti communiste du Québec in the politics of our nation. Many times, we heard people who support our ideas, but who would not necessarily vote for us. Furthermore, bourgeois politicians congratulated us for this great campaign for such a small party, or who literally said they were glad they didn’t have to debate us face-to-face… This in itself is a proof that our message is being spread and rises above the noise of « mainstream » politics!

Let’s be clear, we didn’t want to impress bourgeois politicians nor did we want to integrate ourselves into bourgeois politics. We defended our message not only in front of mainstream politics. We also went to local debates, met with different people’s and democratic groups as well as with unions. Everywhere we went, people were totally receptive to our programme. We know this will not necessarily be represented in terms of votes. But clearly, these connections and encounters are solid foundations to build on and strengthen the Party. After all, we are active not only during elections, but before and after them, for the political struggle is not only in the National Assembly, but also in the streets, in our neighbourhoods, in our schools and in our workplaces.

Overall, we saw that during this campaign, it is not Québec solidaire that is calling out Liberals when they claim to be in favour of « off-market » housing and that tackled them that as long as it is not clearly 100% public, it is not social, but the Communistes. It is not Québec solidaire who called out Éric Duhaime as a former CIA proxy (and it was noticed on air by Radio-Canada...). We are the ones who called out CAQ candidate about his party’s lack of position with regards to unpaid internships. We were the ones to expose Québec solidaire for its gaps with regards to their housing plan, their nonexistent economic plan, their bogus Mamdaniesque plan for public groceries to compete with monopolies, their abandonment of international solidarity, etc.

It is funny how ultra-leftists (anarchists, Trotskyites and others of the same type) keep calling us « reformists » in between elections, but as soon as we run a well-organised campaign, they criticise us for « dividing the left » and not supporting social-democracy.

Well, we are not a movement nor a think-thank, we are a political party. We know that social-democracy can’t be changed. There can be...alliances depending of the situation, but at the end of the day, what matters is that the working class holds political power, and that requires a party that is well organised, independent, and that is strictly aiming for that goal. That party is the Communist Party, and this campaign showed that we are back in the game!

In itself, that is the strongest statement we can make. Everywhere we went, everyone we talked to kept one clear idea of the communists: we are the party of the struggle, we fight to curb monopoly power through expanding labour rights, public services, nationalising key sectors of the industry so that we don’t need to rely on monopolies and US imperialism for our development, we fight for peace and international solidarity. In a nutshell, people understood that we are the Party of Socialism. That’s who we are. Now is time to organise and get that message louder and better understood among the toiling masses.

For profiles of the candidates and where they are running see: https://particommunisteduquebec.ca/elections-2026/

For the party platform see: https://particommunisteduquebec.ca/plateforme-2026/