By Daniel Béland

September 3, 2025

For any readers who haven’t been following the saga, l’affaire SAAQclic is — in optics, political hazard and impenetrable digital chaos — the Quebec version of the federal cost-overrun and payroll-error scandal that was the $5 billion Phoenix fiasco.

And, as the province’s summer political spectacle, the public inquiry into the mess has offered all the crisis and cover-up drama of a Netflix political potboiler without the corpses.

Less than 15 months before the next scheduled provincial election, Premier François Legault’s  Coalition Avenir Québec trails the Parti Québécois (PQ) and the Liberal Party of Quebec (LPQ) in the polls. Support for Québec independence is enjoying a comeback. And after the CAQ’s dramatic loss against the PQ at in the Arthabaska byelection last month, Legault was looking for a fresh start. Instead, the Gallant inquiry and the apparent diversionary gambit of banning public prayer have only compounded the controversy surrounding the government.

On Tuesday, Legault testified before the Gallant commission he appointed to look into the IT debacle at Société de l’assurance automobile du Québec (SAAQ), the province’s automobile insurance board (not to be confused with the SAQ, or provincial alcohol distributor and retailer).

During his testimony, Legault said he wasn’t aware of cost overrun issues with the provincial drivers’ licensing agency’s digital transition — known as CASA and including the SAAQclic transaction platform —  until an auditor general’s report earlier this year revealed the project was $500 million over budget.

Legault blamed SAAQ officials for not doing their jobs properly while stating that two successive transport ministers in his Coalition Avenir Québec (CAQ) government — François Bonnardel and, more recently, Geneviève Guilbaut — “could have asked more questions” once they had heard about the coast overruns. As the Journal de Montréal put it rather sarcastically on its front page the day after the widely watched testimony: “Everybody knew… expect Legault”.

Although the premier was well-prepared and did not make any major mistakes, the simple fact that he had to testify about this is bad optics for him and his government. The very existence of the Gallant commission has worsened rather than lessened his political headaches over SAAQclic; a reminder that the creation of commissions of inquiry is always a calculated damage-control risk for any government.

Like an old rock star whose popularity has waned, Legault is reprising one of his greatest hits — secularism — in a bid to restore his popularity among the older francophone voters who are a vital part of its base.

Indeed, some critics of the CAQ government such as former senator and LPQ supporter André Pratte see a direct link between the ongoing SAAQclic affair, the party’s poor standing in the polls, and the recent, internationally viral announcement by secularism Minister Jean-François Roberge that the government will soon table on bill aimed at banning prayer in public.

Partly because of the popularity among the CAQ francophone base of Bill 21, the Act respecting the laicity of the State adopted in 2019, secularism is seen as a politically advantageous issue by the Legault government, which also faces pressures from the PQ to double down on secularism.

Like an old rock star whose popularity has waned, Legault is reprising one of his greatest hits — secularism — in a bid to restore his popularity among the older francophone voters who are a vital part of its base.

The targeting of street prayer is related to extensive media coverage of a few instances of Muslim prayers witnessed recently at pro-Palestinian protests in Montreal. Critics of the CAQ government from both the religious and the legal side argue that this proposed ban raises serious issues with regard to the respect of individual rights in the province.

This backlash has not stopped the CAQ government, partly because the ban on street prayers and, more generally, the new secularism bill are supported by prominent voices on the right and within nationalist circles, including those who claim Islamism has become a threat to Quebec society.

Could this new push on secularism actually help the CAQ turn things around in the polls? At this point, this is probably a long shot, as the party faces a steep uphill battle toward the next election, with a premier who is now the least popular in the country and, as party founder, difficult to dislodge.

Meanwhile, Quebeckers will hear a lot about both SAAQclic and secularism, two issues that have little in common expect pointing towards the apparent desperation of an embattled government and its once-popular premier.

Daniel Béland is professor of political science and director of the McGill Institute for the Study of Canada at McGill University.