Canada: Election: Quebec's 3rd Party, Democratic Action of Quebec (ADQ) supports federal Conservatives

An unsigned brief article (Jan10,2k6) in the Quebec daily LeDevoir gives us a glimpse of new developments in the province's electoral activity, a news item which it's taken me sometime to catch up with. But to get the flavour of things in la belle province, here's my very free, expanded and explanatory translation of that item:

Following the lead of the provincial parliamentary member for Beauce-North, Janvier Grondin, now two other parliamentary members, called "deputies," of the provincial political party Democratic Action of Quebec (ADQ) are publicly supporting a Conservative candidate during the upcoming federal elections.

The province calls its parliament "National Assembly." The provincial parliamentary member for Lotbinière, la députée Sylvie Roy, and le député for Chutes-de-la Chaudière (which latter translates as "Boiler Falls"), Marc Picardy, gave their support to Jacques Gourd, the candidate of the Conservative Party in la circonscripton (or "riding" as we say in English-speaking Canada, or "Congressional district" as Americans say in their context) - which combines the two provincial ridings into the federal riding of Lotbinière-Chutes-de-la-Chaudière. An activist in the ADQ, Mr. Gourd was until the announcement of his candidacy for the federal election, President of the County Executive for Mrs. Roy. For his part, Janvier Grondin had lined up behind the Conservative candidate in Beauce County, Maxime Bernier. Now he's running too. That's three "adéquistes" as ADQ party members are called, now running for the Conservatives on the federal level.

These developments were not foreseen by most of us Commoners, when we first wondered if the Conservs could shake the Libs from their seemingly-everlasting control of the House of Commons. - Politicarp