Saint-Hyacinthe—Bagot, QC — 2008 Federal Election Results Map

Saint-Hyacinthe—Bagot

Two regional county municipalities, Les Maskoutains and Acton, formed this Montérégie riding of roughly 1,950 square kilometres about 60 kilometres east of Montreal. Saint-Hyacinthe on the Yamaska River is the urban centre; Acton Vale, Saint-Pie, Sainte-Madeleine, Saint-Dominique and Upton are among the two dozen surrounding towns and villages. Just under 96,000 people lived in the riding at the 2006 census.

Candidates

Ève-Mary Thaï Thi Lac (Bloc Québécois) — The sitting member, seeking her first full term. Born in 1972 and raised on a farm near Acton Vale, she studied criminology and interethnic relations with a focus on immigration law and holds a graduate diploma in public management from the École nationale d'administration publique. From 1998 to 2005 she ran a foster home for adolescents with severe intellectual and developmental disabilities, and between 2002 and 2006 boarded students coming to Quebec for French immersion. A Parti Québécois and Bloc volunteer since the early 1990s, she worked in Yvan Loubier's constituency office and won the by-election of 17 September 2007, called after he resigned that February to run provincially.

René Vincelette (Conservative) — The Conservative nominee, from Mont-Saint-Hilaire.

Brigitte Sansoucy (NDP) — Born in 1963 and holding a bachelor's degree in business administration, Sansoucy had run the Auberge du cœur Le Baluchon in Saint-Hyacinthe, a shelter and support service for young people in difficulty, since 1996. She had contested the September 2007 by-election for the New Democrats and returned as their candidate a year later.

Denise Tremblay (Liberal) — Stood for the Liberal Party.

Jacques Tétreault (Green Party) — The Green candidate, from Saint-Dominique, who had also been on the by-election ballot.

About the Riding

Saint-Hyacinthe, with 51,616 residents in 2006, calls itself Canada's agri-food technopolis and has the institutions to support the claim. The Université de Montréal's faculty of veterinary medicine — the only one in Quebec and the only French-language veterinary school in North America — is based there, alongside a federal food research and development centre, the Institut de technologie agroalimentaire, an agri-environment research institute and the province's artificial insemination centre for livestock. A biotechnology park gathers food science firms around them.

The city has an older industrial identity too. Casavant Frères, founded in the 19th century, builds pipe organs installed in churches and concert halls around the world, and a second organ builder, Orgues Létourneau, works in the same city. The Hôpital Honoré-Mercier and the Cégep de Saint-Hyacinthe rank among the largest employers, and the annual agricultural exposition draws producers from across the province.

Beyond the urban core, Les Maskoutains holds the densest concentration of farming in Quebec — dairy herds, hog barns, and grain and vegetable land spread across the flat plain of the Yamaska. The Acton RCM to the east mixes dairy country with small industry centred on Acton Vale. Supply management for dairy, poultry and eggs is the federal file that matters most in this riding, and Canada's negotiating position at the World Trade Organization surfaced regularly during the campaign. Federal food inspection had also drawn national attention that summer after a listeriosis outbreak was traced to a federally inspected meat plant.

The riding is almost entirely francophone. The Bloc Québécois had held it continuously since 1993, first under Loubier and then, after his departure for provincial politics, under Thaï Thi Lac.