Legault calls on Quebec opposition party leaders to boycott Facebook

QUEBEC CITY – CAQ leader François Legault is calling on Québec solidaire (QS) and the Quebec Liberal Party (PLQ) to stop buying ads on Facebook, even though he doesn’t rule out the possibility of his party buying some as well.

The parties had agreed in July to a boycott of Meta’s platforms, in support of Quebec media, but QS and the PLQ are reversing their decision, citing the ongoing by-election in Jean-Talon.

For their part, the Coalition avenir Québec (CAQ) and the Parti québécois (PQ) are continuing the boycott, denouncing what they describe as a lack of solidarity and fairness.

The PQ even tabled a motion on Tuesday afternoon calling on the parties to stand together and not buy ads on Meta, but QS and the PLQ did not give their consent to debate it.

QS and the PLQ have paid for advertising on the Meta group’s platforms to get their candidates elected, and intend to continue doing so between now between now and the October 2 vote.

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“Our media are suffering because of Facebook,” recalled the Premier at a press scrum on Tuesday, the day the National Assembly resumed in Quebec City.

“I think it’s important that all parties boycott Facebook advertising,” he said, calling for fairness in the Jean-Talon election campaign.

Because Meta is a “powerful tool” for contacting voters, the CAQ leader acknowledged.

“It doesn’t make sense that there are two parties, the Liberal Party and Québec solidaire, who use Meta, and then there are two others, the Parti québécois and the CAQ, who don’t, it’s really not fair.”

He said his party would have to “ask itself the question” because it was “really unfair”, in his words.

The boycott was launched following Meta’s decision to block Canadian media articles on its platforms.

QS had to defend itself on Tuesday for having spent on advertising on Meta’s platforms, after having suggested in July that it would not encourage Facebook until further notice.

According to parliamentary leader Gabriel Nadeau-Dubois, in the context of the by-election in Jean-Talon, these platforms are essential for contacting voters, and symbolic gestures don’t provide a solution.

“We’ll continue to place ads (on Facebook),” he said at a press briefing on the first day of parliament in Quebec City. “I think all this just goes to show that symbolic gestures won’t solve our problem.”

The QS spokesman also refuses to be lectured by Quebec Communications Minister Mathieu Lacombe, who on Monday condemned QS, as did the Board of Trade of Metropolitan Montreal (CCMM).

“There are interests that are superior to your party’s interest,” CCMM president Michel Leblanc said in an interview with Québecor.

“I’m telling you that finger-pointing and symbolic demonstrations have a big, big limit and won’t solve our problem,” insisted Nadeau-Dubois.

Instead, QS is calling for “structural solutions” from the Quebec government, such as taxing the web giants.

The PQ, which continues its boycott of Meta, doubts QS’s sense of ethics and denounces its lack of solidarity.

“Our media are dying for lack of revenue, it’s the pillar of democracy, and then there you have political parties who, to make a small gain of 1 or 2 per cent in a by-election, are ready to abandon all their principles and then abandon our Quebec media for the benefit of a multinational,” condemned PQ leader Paul St-Pierre Plamondon, in a press scrum.

“I’m talking specifically about Québec solidaire. It’s indefensible in my eyes. We have to stand united and make sure our Quebec media are viable vis-à-vis giants that are unscrupulous.”

In fact, the PQ tabled a motion in the National Assembly proposing that elected officials show “solidarity with our national and regional media who have seen their advertising revenues diverted to Meta platforms”.

The motion asked parties not to buy ads or sponsor publications on Meta right now, and not to use these platforms this Friday – a day of boycott organized by the Fédération professionnelle des journalistes du Québec (FPJQ) and the Société québécoise des professionnels en relations publiques.

QS and the PLQ refused to debate the issue.

The Quebec Liberal Party has also stated that it will not end its Facebook advertising campaigns until the by-election on October 2.

Interim leader Marc Tanguay pointed out that 88 per cent of Quebecers are on Facebook, and that it’s important to be able to connect with these voters.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published in French on Sept. 12, 2023.