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John James "Jean" Charest, PC (born June 24, 1958) is a Canadian politician who served as the 29th Premier of Quebec, from 2003 to 2012. He lost the provincial election held September 4, 2012 and left his functions as Premier on September 19. He was the Deputy Prime Minister of Canada from June 25, 1993, until November 4, 1993. Charest was the leader of the federal Progressive Conservative Party of Canada from 1993 to 1998 and has been the leader of the Quebec Liberal Party since 1998. On September 5, 2012 Jean Charest announced he will be resigning as Quebec Liberal Leader and leaving politics.
Jean Charest was born on June 24, 1958 in Sherbrooke, located in the Eastern Townships (today known as the Estrie region). Some have claimed that Charest downplays his legal first name ...
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For a while there, it was like Jean Charest was at open-mic night. He joked about how Alberta Premier Alison Redford’s French was so good, people back home wondered if she could coach the Habs. Talking about a labour-mobility pact between his province and France, Mr. Charest said, “you have no idea the excitement Quebecers felt when we created more French lawyers.” And, noting the rising international demand for diamonds from Quebec’s nascent industry, he said, “I have made a commitment not to buy any diamonds. It’s a matter of ...
Call it the Charest paradox. Even though the Quebec Premier has never been much loved throughout his 14 years as head of the provincial Liberal Party, and even though a huge proportion of Quebeckers are dissatisfied with his government, Jean Charest still has a fair chance to be re-elected for a fourth mandate when he decides to hold an election – maybe in the spring.
This is due to two reasons: an unusual resilience that allows him to pass through the worst political storms with a kind of placid stoicism and Zen-like attitude, and the ineptitude of the opposition parties that will ...
... tuition hikes
As student protests gain momentum, attracting widespread public support throughout Quebec, Premier Jean Charest is standing firm in his government’s decision to proceed with steep tuition-fee hikes.
University tuition fees in Quebec, the lowest in the country, will increase starting in September by $325 a year for the next five years, a 75-per-cent jump by 2016-2017. So far, 78,000 university and college students have joined a province-wide general strike and their numbers continue to grow, driven in part by the support of almost half of Quebeckers, according to ...