Chassin resignation: He had joined CAQ to improve Quebec’s economic outlook

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Until he very publicly resigned from the CAQ on Thursday over his dissatisfaction with the party’s economic policies, Youri Chassin had kept a fairly low profile as a backbencher MNA since he was elected in 2018.

But the economist who said he was drawn to politics by a strong commitment to improving social policy issues voiced some grumblings with his political situation two years ago over the fact he was not given a cabinet minister post by Premier François Legault after being elected for a second term in 2022.

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Born in the Laurentians town of Ste-Agathe-des-Monts, Chassin earned a bachelor’s degree and a master’s degree in economics from the Université de Montréal, where he was already politically involved as an elected member of the Quebec Federation of University Students (FEUQ). After university, he worked as an economist and research director for the Montreal Economic Institute, responsible for analyzing public policies and commenting on them in the media.

When he was announced as the candidate for the riding of St-Jérôme, Legault lauded their long association together and Chassin’s merits as an economist.

“Youri was vice-president of the Fédération universitaire du Québec … That’s how we met almost 20 years ago, when I was minister of education and youth,” Legault said on Chassin’s bio page in the run-up to the 2018 elections. “What unites us first and foremost is this desire to make education a true national priority. Youri also has the ambition of a prosperous Quebec. Like him, I am convinced that Quebec can and must do better.”

Chassin said it was the size of the public debt and a desire to rescue Quebec from the status quo that inspired him to run. “Let us ask ourselves the question: what has changed in the nearly 15 years since the Liberals came to power? … The greatest risk is to do nothing.”

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He was elected by a wide margin in the CAQ landslide of 2018 and again in 2022 as the MNA for St-Jérôme, located 45 kilometres northwest of Montreal, the gateway to the Laurentians. In his first term, he served as parliamentary secretary of the economy and innovation minister. In the second, he was parliamentary secretary to Health Minister Christian Dubé.

Soon after his re-election in 2022, however, he stated publicly on Facebook he was disappointed at not being named a cabinet minister.

“Having had the opportunity to make a tangible contribution to easing regulatory frameworks in my first term, I will not hide my disappointment at not having been called,” he wrote. But he resolved to stay on to “change Quebec.”

He made minor headlines in 2020 when he travelled to Peru during the pandemic despite a ban on non-essential travel to see his husband there. He said the trip was in fact essential because his spouse was having immigration issues allowing him to come to Quebec, and the trip was pre-approved by Legault.

On Thursday, Chassin criticized his party’s economic track record, saying it was responsible for a historic $11-billion deficit, “heaping money on problems instead of seeking to do things differently,” and that it had lost its energy to try to shake up the status quo.

rbruemmer@postmedia.com

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