Destined to be the only candidate from Quebec in the race for the leadership of the Liberal Party of Canada (PLC), the billionaire from the West Island of Montreal Frank Baylis does not immediately define himself as a “Quebecer”.
“I am French Canadian. But I am also English Canadian. I don’t define myself as belonging to one group or another,” explains the businessman, sitting at a café in downtown Ottawa to grant an interview to Duty.
Frank Baylis caused a surprise among the federal Liberals by being the very first person to announce his intention to replace Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau, who announced his resignation last Monday. Mr. Trudeau will not run again in the next election.
Elected to the Trudeau team in 2015, the 62-year-old Montrealer represented the riding of Pierrefonds — Dollard for a single term. He did not run again in 2019, shocked by the “waste of time” associated with the work of an MP. He is also running to change the way Parliament works.
The trained engineer made his fortune by taking over the medical equipment manufacturing company first founded by his nurse mother, Baylis Medical Technologies. Born from the union of a mother from Barbados and a father who arrived from the United Kingdom, “an Englishman with a mustache”, he attributes his good command of French to his parents’ determination to send him to the school in the common language of Quebec, even if he was not immediately accepted there. “The school [francophone] didn’t want to sign me up. She didn’t want English speakers at the time. It would be good if you wrote that down! »
The two Quebec politicians who said they were thinking about running for the leadership of the Liberal Party, the Minister of Foreign Affairs, Mélanie Joly, and the Minister of Innovation, Science and Industry, François-Philippe Champagne, have announced that they are giving it up.
Billionaire ahead of Trump
Despite his time as an MP, Frank Baylis believes that he is not a career politician, and presents this as an important asset. “My team says I need to start bragging a little. I have had a lot of success,” he says frankly. One of his companies was sold, he says, for US$1.75 billion.
His business experience also led him to “meet guys like Mr. Trump,” he explains, in reference to the bellicose attitude of the man who will officially become President of the United States again on Monday, Donald Trump, also a billionaire. This would ensure that threats of tariffs and repeated jokes about the upcoming annexation of Canada would have “no impact” on him.
“When it comes time to deal with Mr. Trump, we will look at each other with both eyes on the same level. Right away, he will have a respect for me that he would not have for others. I know the games he’s going to play very well, I know it’s not going to work on me. »
Serious candidate
Frank Baylis acknowledges that he is not really known in political circles, and that he has little time to prove that he is a serious candidate to replace Justin Trudeau. His large network of contacts means that he will have no trouble raising the $350,000 that the party is asking for as registration fees, he assures.
He finds it difficult to forgive the repeated deficits of the government of which he was once a part. He promises budgetary rigor. “When we talk about making life affordable… It’s the deficits that affect the price of our dollar. And when the price of our dollar falls, the price of shopping goes up. That’s how it is. »
Above all, he feels that power is too concentrated in the hands of the Prime Minister, and promises to “strengthen democracy” by redistributing it, whether to the Speaker of the House of Commons or to the simple deputies. If he is elected leader on March 9, he promises to stay in office for at least 4 years. “I’m coming back [en politique] for my country first, and for my party second. And for me, third. »
Mr. Baylis’ entourage was also present at the time of the interview. The businessman is notably assisted by Marc Lavigne, a liberal political organizer who worked on the victorious campaign of former liberal leader Stéphane Dion, who caused a surprise by winning the race in the fourth round of voting, in 2006. However, the Liberal Party did not return to power until nine years later.
The two favorite candidates in the PLC leadership race, former Bank of Canada Governor Mark Carney and former Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland, must announce the official launch of their campaign in the coming months. days.
Frank Baylis wrote on his social networks that it is “essential” that Justin Trudeau’s replacement be bilingual, after an MP from the Ottawa region and only official candidate, Chandra Arya, had said in Duty that mastery of French is not necessary to become a Liberal leader.
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