Quebec government fires SAAQ CEO Éric Ducharme

The Legault government has fired Éric Ducharme, president and CEO of the Société de l’assurance automobile du Québec (SAAQ), The Canadian Press has confirmed.

Ducharme, a former Treasury Board secretary, was appointed to the position in April 2023 to restore order at the SAAQ, which has been in crisis since the disastrous rollout of its SAAQclic platform.

“The situation has not been resolved and this organization is perpetually in crisis because control has not been regained,” Transport Minister Geneviève Guilbault said at a press conference in Quebec City on Wednesday.

“Quebecers still haven’t regained their confidence. (…) For me, it was obvious that a change at the head of the SAAQ was needed,” she added, believing that the previous management under Ducharme suffered from “indolence.”

In June, an internal SAAQ auditor, Nadia Brière, reported to the Gallant Commission investigating the SAAQclic fiasco that, in her opinion, mismanagement of contracts was continuing at the Crown corporation.

The Unité permanente anticorruption (UPAC) also conducted a search of the SAAQ’s head office on June 18.

Brière corroborated the statements of her former colleague, Marie-Line Lalonde, that Ducharme had very little interest in internal auditing.

Lalonde told the commission that she felt as if she had been “spit on” during a meeting in January 2024 where Ducharme stood by, seemingly saying, “I don’t want your work.”

Ducharme has not yet provided his version of events to the commission, as Judge Denis Gallant denied the request of SAAQ lawyer Sébastien Laprise to advance his testimony.

In recent months, Premier François Legault and Minister of Transport Geneviève Guilbault had refused to publicly reiterate their confidence in Ducharme.

Legault had indicated that he would wait for the Gallant report before taking action. In addition to the Gallant commission, investigations are underway at UPAC, the Autorité des marchés publics, and the Ministry of Transport.

Guilbault argued Wednesday that the government “cannot afford to wait for the report, because the situation has been ongoing for a long time” at the SAAQ.

According to information first published by Le Journal de Québec and then confirmed by Geneviève Guilbault, the SAAQ’s vice-president of policyholder services, Annie Lafond, will replace Ducharme on an interim basis.

Annie Lafond, the current vice-president of policyholder services at the SAAQ, is expected to replace him as CEO, according to information obtained by The Canadian Press on Wednesday.

Before joining the SAAQ a few months ago, Lafond held the position of vice-president of digital transformation and customer experience at Beneva for five years.

At a press conference, Guilbault also expressed her satisfaction that her new CEO comes from the private insurance sector. “Ms. Lafond has the ideal profile, in my opinion, to take the reins of the SAAQ. I thank her for accepting,” she said. 

Double admission of failure, says the opposition

Ducharme is the second SAAQ CEO to be appointed by the Legault government and then dismissed by the same government. “Two CEOs fired by the CAQ, a double admission of failure,” reacted Liberal MNA Monsef Derraji.

“We are trying to clean up the house at the top of the organization, but political responsibility cannot be swept under the carpet,” he said in a message sent to The Canadian Press on Wednesday.

“Nothing is going well and Ms. Guilbault must stop blaming others and take responsibility,” he added.

“After months of improvisation, it is legitimate to wonder if she is still the right person to regain the trust of the population,” added Quebec Solidaire spokesperson Ruba Ghazal.

Guilbault defended herself in front of journalists for not taking responsibility, saying she had always been “extremely present weekly with the SAAQ.”

“We are in constant meetings with the SAAQ to ensure things improve. (…) Ultimately, my responsibility is to change (the CEO) if it doesn’t work.

“I must be one of the ministers who is most involved in a state-owned company. (…) I could not take on more responsibility (…) than I am doing here. I cannot be the CEO,” she maintained.

For his part, the PQ MNA for the Magdalen Islands, Joël Arseneau, pointed out in an interview that the announcement of Ducharme’s dismissal comes in “the middle of summer, when people are starting their vacations.”

“Accountability will come one day or another, and I think that Quebecers will pass a very harsh judgment on the CAQ for all of its work, but particularly regarding the management of this fiasco,” he declared. 

The Quebec Government Professionals Union (SPGQ) is still talking about a “good first step to clean up the management” of the state-owned company.

“Cleaning up must also be done in the subcontracting contracts responsible for the SAAQclic fiasco,” said the fourth vice-president of the SPGQ, Daniel Goyette, in a press release. 

–This report by La Presse Canadienne was translated by CityNews