Paul St-Pierre Plamondon

Paul St-Pierre Plamondon MNA (French: [pɔl sɛ̃ pjɛʁ plamɔ̃dɔ̃]; often identified by his initials: PSPP; born February 17, 1977) is a Canadian lawyer, media personality, and politician.

Paul St-Pierre Plamondon MNA
St-Pierre Plamondon in 2021
Leader of the Parti Québécois
Incumbent
Assumed office October 9, 2020
Preceded by	Pascal Bérubé (interim)
Member of the National Assembly for Camille-Laurin
Incumbent
Assumed office October 3, 2022
Preceded by	Richard Campeau
Personal details
Born	(1977-02-17) February 17, 1977 (age 48) Trois-Rivières, Quebec, Canada
Political party	Parti Québécois (provincial)
Other political affiliations	Bloc Québécois (federal)
Spouse	Alexandra Tremblay
Alma mater	McGill University Lund University Oxford University
Profession	Lawyer entrepreneur columnist author

He has been the leader of the Parti Québécois since October 9, 2020. He represents Camille-Laurin in the National Assembly of Quebec.

Education

Paul St-Pierre Plamondon began his college studies at Collège André-Grasset and graduated in 1997.

He holds a BA in Civil and Common Law from McGill University (2001), an MBA from Oxford University (2006), and a Certificate in International Law from Lund University (2001).^[1]

Early career

In 2003, he was a volunteer prosecutor for the Permanent Assembly of Human Rights in Sucre, Bolivia. In 2005, he worked with the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) in Belgium. St-Pierre Plamondon was also a lawyer in the litigation department of Stikeman Elliott, a national law firm.^[2]

In 2009, he joined the Delegatus law firm as vice-president and shareholder of the study.^[3] Recognized for his social involvement, St-Pierre Plamondon was awarded the title of Lawyer of the Year in 2010, in the pro bono category, at the annual conference of the Young Bar of Montreal to celebrate the "leaders of tomorrow".^[4]

Social and political engagement

In 2007, he co-founded Génération d'idées, a nonprofit thinking group whose mission is to engage young people from 20 to 35 in public debate by inviting them to express themselves on social themes in the various platforms of Génération d'idées.

In 2009, with the aim of promoting Génération d'idées and to sound out the opinion of Québec's Generation Y, Paul St-Pierre Plamondon visited 19 Québec cities in 63 days and gathered the thoughts of 500 young people. Following that exercise, he published the essay Des jeunes et l'avenir du Québec: les rêveries d'un promeneur solitaire.^[5][6]

In 2011, he began as co-host of the radio show Génératrice on Radio-Canada’s Première Chaîne. In October 2011, the Génération d’idées group planted more than 250 brooms in front of the National Assembly in Québec City^[7] and stepped up public interventions to call for a public inquiry into the construction industry in Québec.^[8] Paul St-Pierre Plamondon’s interventions in favour of this commission of inquiry led Radio-Canada to request that he be removed from the program as a co-host.^[9]

In 2012, he defended students on walkout in front of the courts^[10] and participated in the demonstration of lawyers against Bill 78 (now Bill 12). In September 2013, he resigned as president of Génération d’idées. In February 2014, he became a journalist for Les Affaires newspaper.

In October 2014, he published a second essay entitled Les Orphelins politiques: plaidoyer pour un renouveau du paysage politique québécois, in which he advocated for the emergence of a new movement that would fill the void felt by several political orphans.

He is the author of several open letters and media interventions on various current issues, including politics.

Parti Québécois (2016–present)

In 2016, he was a candidate in the 2016 Parti Québécois leadership race, finishing fourth with 6.84% support. One of his main commitments during this race was to reconnect the party with all Québécois people.

On October 23, 2016, the leader of the Parti Québécois, Jean-François Lisée, announced the appointment of Paul St-Pierre Plamondon to the position of Special Advisor to the leader of the Parti Québécois, after he had joined the Party.^[11] Under the project “Dare to rethink the PQ”, Paul St-Pierre Plamondon’s mandate included consulting the people of Québec on the renewal of the Party and drafting, at the end of this process, a report and recommendations on the relaunch of the Parti Québécois.^[12] The open consultation was particularly aimed at the business community, particularly entrepreneurs and other professionals, members of Québec’s diversity and those under the age of 40. After 162 consultations with more than 3,600 people, it tabled a report with 156 recommendations in April 2017.^[13] At the PQ National Congress in September 2017, 44 recommendations were accepted by the PQ National Executive Council.^[14] The majority of the other recommendations were adopted at the extraordinary Parti Québécois convention in Trois-Rivières in November 2019.

As the candidate for the Parti Québécois in the county of Prévost in the 2018 Quebec general election,^[15] Paul St-Pierre Plamondon faced former Quebec Liberal Party minister Marguerite Blais, who now represented the Coalition Avenir Québec. During this local election campaign, St-Pierre Plamondon prioritized the environment, the quality of public services and support for families.^[16] Presented as a star contestant,^[17] he was defeated by Marguerite Blais.^[18]

On January 28, 2020, he officially announced his candidacy for the leadership of the Parti Québécois. Its slogan—OUI—announces a positive and unifying campaign, firmly focused on independence and the celebration of Québec in 2020. Contrary to its constitutional position of 2016, it now promises a popular consultation on independence in a first mandate. As part of this leadership race, he will publish his third essay Rebâtir le camp du OUI where he presents his game plan to revive the Parti Québécois and the idea of sovereignty. He won the leadership race on October 9, 2020 with 56% of the vote in the third round.

In early 2022, he announced that he would be a candidate in the riding of Camille-Laurin, in Montreal. MNA Richard Campeau, of the Coalition Avenir Québec, had been the sitting MNA since the last elections in 2018. He won the riding on election night, and his party won a total of 3 seats, down from the last legislature.

During the 2022 Quebec general election, he and Gabriel Nadeau-Dubois from Québec solidaire faced some controversy for their use of the word nègre while they discussed academic freedom in schools and universities during a televised debate.^[19]

After the March 2023 election, He broke a record for PQ vote of confidences with 98.51% support.^[20][21][22] On October 2, 2023 the PQ won its 4th seat with its win in the 2023 Jean-Talon provincial by-election, with Pascal Paradis being elected MNA.^[23]

Personal life

St-Pierre Plamondon lives with his wife on Île d'Orléans, near Quebec City. They have three children.^[24]

Electoral record

v t e 2022 Quebec general election: Camille-Laurin
Party	Candidate	Votes	%	±%
	Parti Québécois	Paul St-Pierre Plamondon	11,959	41.68	+15.67
	Coalition Avenir Québec	Richard Campeau	9,165	31.94	+4.37
	Liberal	Christina Eyangos	4,724	12.85	-6.03
	Conservative	Christos Karteris	1,869	6.51	–
	Green	Bourama Keita	641	2.23	–
	Climat Québec	Jean-Pierre Émand	241	0.84	–
	Démocratie directe	Grace St-Gelais	49	0.17	–
	Équipe Autonomiste	Charles Mc Nicoll	42	0.15	–
Total valid votes			28,690	91.32
Total rejected ballots			2,728	8.68
Turnout			31,418	63.45
Eligible voters			49,518

2020 Parti Québécois leadership election results by round^[25]

Candidate		1st round		2nd round		3rd round
		Votes cast	%	Votes cast	%	Votes cast	%
	Paul St-Pierre Plamondon	9,042	35.44%	10,554	41.59%	13,530	56.02%
	Sylvain Gaudreault	8,415	32.98%	8,906	35.09%	10,621	43.98%
	Guy Nantel	5,499	21.55%	5,917	23.32%	Eliminated
	Frédéric Bastien	2,559	10.03%	Eliminated
Total		25,515	100%	25,377	100%	24,151	100%

v t e 2018 Quebec general election: Prévost
Party	Candidate	Votes	%	±%
	Coalition Avenir Québec	Marguerite Blais	14,876	47.03	–
	Parti Québécois	Paul St-Pierre Plamondon	7,739	24.47	–
	Québec solidaire	Lucie Mayer	4,414	13.96	–
	Liberal	Naömie Goyette	4,063	12.85	–
	Conservative	Malcolm Mulcahy	303	0.96	–
	Parti libre	Michel Leclerc	235	0.74	–
Total valid votes			31,630	98.51
Total rejected ballots			477	1.49
Turnout			32,107	70.80
Eligible voters			45,347

2016 Parti Québécois leadership election results by round^[26]

Candidate		1st round		2nd round
		Votes cast	%	Votes cast	%
	Jean-François Lisée	25,936	47.03%	27,801	50.63%
	Alexandre Cloutier	16,357	29.66%	17,403	31.70%
	Martine Ouellet	9,077	16.46%	9,702	17.67%
	Paul St-Pierre Plamondon	3,772	6.84%	Eliminated
Total		55,142	100%	54,906	100%