La Pointe-de-l'Ile

La Pointe-de-l'Ile covers the eastern tip of the Island of Montreal, bounded by the Riviere des Prairies to the north and the St. Lawrence River to the east and south. The riding encompasses the neighbourhood of Pointe-aux-Trembles in the borough of Riviere-des-Prairies—Pointe-aux-Trembles, the independent city of Montreal-Est, and portions of the Mercier-Est and Longue-Pointe neighbourhoods in the borough of Mercier—Hochelaga-Maisonneuve. Created in 2003, it was an open seat in 2011 following the retirement of longtime Bloc Quebecois MP Francine Lalonde, who stepped down in 2010 due to illness.

Candidates

Eve Peclet (NDP) — A law student at the Universite de Montreal at the time of the election, Peclet was 22 years old heading into the 2011 campaign. She had been involved with the NDP since the age of 18, volunteering on election campaigns and helping to found the Young New Democrats Association at her university. She was also active on the university's debate team. Among the youngest candidates in the country, Peclet represented the wave of new NDP recruits in Quebec ridings.

Ginette Beaudry (Bloc Quebecois) — A longtime community activist in the east end of Montreal, Beaudry served as coordinator of the Women's Centre of Montreal-Est—Pointe-aux-Trembles. She was president of the Bloc Quebecois riding executive in La Pointe-de-l'Ile and had served on the constituency's steering committee from 1995 to 2005. She won the Bloc nomination in a contested vote, defeating Jean-Claude Rocheleau in a second-round ballot.

Olivier L. Coulombe (Liberal), Mathieu Drolet (Conservative), and David J. Cox (Green Party) also sought election. Claude Brunelle ran for the Marxist-Leninist Party.

About the Riding

La Pointe-de-l'Ile has a distinctly working-class and industrial character shaped by its location at Montreal's eastern extremity. The city of Montreal-Est, a small independent municipality of several thousand residents, was historically one of Canada's most prominent petrochemical centres. Major oil companies including Shell, BP, Gulf, Imperial Oil, and Texaco once operated refineries and storage facilities there, though most closed during the 1980s, leaving the Suncor refinery — producing roughly 137,000 barrels per day of gasoline, distillates, and petrochemicals — as one of the last major operations.

Pointe-aux-Trembles, the riding's largest neighbourhood, is a predominantly francophone area with a population density well below the Montreal average and one of the highest homeownership rates among the city's boroughs. The neighbourhood has significant communities of Italian and Haitian origin. Manufacturing and retail trade are among the largest employment sectors. The area's industrial heritage brought ongoing concerns about environmental remediation of former refinery lands, air quality, and economic transition. The riding sat squarely in eastern Montreal's sovereigntist heartland, having been held by the Bloc Quebecois since the riding's creation, and before that by Bloc members in its predecessor districts going back to 1993.