Yves Montigny, MP for the René-Lévesque constituency and vice-president of the Committee on Agriculture, Fisheries, Energy and Natural Resources, was contacted by telephone and questioned about this situation.
He claims to have already had a meeting with the regional president of the union of Hydro-Québec trade employees, Billy Leonard, on the centralization project in Varennes and Beauport.
Mr. Leonard also confirmed this first meeting, without however having received any feedback from elected officials since.
Mr. Montigny recalled more than once during the interview “that he did not have all the powers” nor “be the minister of Hydro-Québec”.
He specified “having the power of influence” with his colleagues in the National Assembly by applying “the vision of the CAQ”.
The vision to which the MP refers is that of decentralizing jobs to the regions and not the opposite as is the case in this case.
The prefect of the MRC of Manicouagan, Marcel Furlong, who was informed by the Journal of the situation, confides that he had a discussion with representatives of Hydro-Québec following our call.
“We will monitor this situation very closely because losing 20 jobs of this quality would be disastrous,” he comments. He says he wants to make sure “that this doesn’t happen for the good of our community.”
The mayor of Baie-Comeau, Michel Desbiens, for his part, refused to comment on the situation following our request for an interview by email.
