Rivière-des-Mille-Îles

Rivière-des-Mille-Îles is a suburban riding on Montreal's north shore, located across the Rivière des Mille Îles from Laval. The riding encompasses the cities of Saint-Eustache, Deux-Montagnes, and Sainte-Marthe-sur-le-Lac in the Deux-Montagnes regional county municipality, as well as the city of Boisbriand in the Thérèse-De Blainville regional county municipality.

Candidates

Laurin Liu (NDP) — A twenty-year-old McGill University student studying history and cultural studies at the time of the election. Liu was active on campus as a board member of CKUT radio and a staff member of the McGill Daily. She was fluent in French, English, and Cantonese. Liu was among several young NDP candidates in Quebec who ran without significant campaign resources, part of a broader slate put forward as the party sought to build its presence in the province.

Luc Desnoyers (Bloc Québécois) — The incumbent MP, first elected in 2008. Desnoyers had a long career in Quebec's labour movement, having worked at the Kenworth plant in Sainte-Thérèse starting in 1971 and rising through the ranks of the Canadian Auto Workers union. He was elected Quebec director of the CAW in 1995, and held the position of vice-president of the Quebec Federation of Labour (FTQ). He also served on the board of the Quebec Workers' Solidarity Fund.

Denis Joannette (Liberal) — The Liberal Party candidate in the riding.

Lucie Leblanc (Conservative) — The Conservative Party candidate in the riding.

Gilles Bisson (Green Party) — The Green Party candidate in the riding.

About the Riding

The riding is defined by its suburban commuter character, with many residents travelling to Montreal or Laval for work. Saint-Eustache, the largest municipality in the riding with a 2011 population of approximately 44,000, serves as the commercial centre of the Deux-Montagnes area. The city has roots dating to the 18th century and was a site of the Patriotes' rebellion of 1837. Boisbriand, with a population of roughly 27,000, experienced significant economic disruption when General Motors closed its assembly plant there in 2002—the only GM plant in Quebec. The former plant site was subsequently redeveloped into the Faubourg Boisbriand, a large commercial and residential complex. The town of Deux-Montagnes, with about 17,000 residents, was a key terminus of the heavily used Deux-Montagnes commuter rail line into downtown Montreal, which carried approximately 30,000 daily riders across its full route. Sainte-Marthe-sur-le-Lac was one of the fastest-growing communities in the region, with a 2011 population of about 15,700 representing a nearly 39 percent increase since 2006. The riding is predominantly francophone, with over 90 percent of residents in the main municipalities declaring French as their mother tongue. The local economy was rooted in retail, light industry, and service-sector employment, with proximity to the broader Montreal aerospace and manufacturing clusters in the Laurentides and Thérèse-De Blainville corridors.