What Would Canadian Politics Look Like if Quebec Left - the 2026 Edition

People haven’t been thinking about this stuff for decades. But now they’re talking about a possible Parti Quebecois sweep in the next provincial election - and of a third referendum that would follow.

So what might a nine-province electoral map look like in 2026? That, of course, would depend on a number of fascinating variables. Here’s how my AI buddy saw a number of ways that it all might play out in the context of a re-imagined 2025 federal election:

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This is speculative, but we can base it on the actual results by province and seat-allocation rules.

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🎯 Step 1 — Remove Quebec Seats

With Quebec seceded:

• Quebec’s 78 seats are removed from the House of Commons.

• The new hypothetical total would be 343 − 78 = 265 seats.

This assumes that none of the Quebec seats are redistributed pro-rata to other provinces and that they are simply removed from the parliament.

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🗳️ Step 2 — Reassign National Seat Results (Ex-Quebec)

We need to approximate how the remaining 265 seats would be distributed among parties. A reasonable approach is:

1. Remove all Quebec seats from each party’s total

   • Liberals in Quebec: 44 seats

   • Conservatives in Quebec: 11 seats

   • Bloc Québécois: All 22 seats (Bloc only runs in Quebec)

   • NDP in Quebec: 1 seat

2. Subtract these from the national totals:

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🧮 Step 3 — New Majority Threshold

In a 265-seat parliament:

• A majority would require 133 seats or more (half + 1).

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🧠 Step 4 — Interpret the Hypothetical Outcome

🟦 Conservative Party

With 133 seats, the Conservatives would meet the new majority threshold in this Quebec-free scenario.

• Conservatives: 133 seats → Majority (133/265 seats).

• Their share of seats among the remaining provinces becomes ~50%.

🟥 Liberal Party

The Liberals would have 125 seats, falling short of a majority:

• Liberals: 125 seats → Minority (≈47% of seats).

🟧 NDP & Greens

• NDP: 6 seats, still a small caucus.

• Greens: 1 seat.

🟪 Bloc Québécois

• With Quebec gone, the Bloc would have no federal representation (zero seats), eliminating it from the Commons.

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🧩 Important Notes & Assumptions

⚠️ This is a simplified counterfactual that assumes:

• Seats are removed, not redistributed proportionally. In reality, if the House of Commons were rebalanced after a province secedes, other provinces might gain seats.

• Voters in Quebec do not vote in other provincial jurisdictions; no vote migration is modeled.

• Party vote shares outside Quebec remain exactly the same as in the actual 2025 results.

These assumptions are necessary to make a clear comparison based on available data but mean this scenario is illustrative rather than predictive.

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I can also model what the popular vote share would look like excluding Quebec, or how different redistribution rules (e.g., shifting Quebec’s seats to other provinces) would change the outcome.

To do this responsibly, I’ll turn the exercise into explicit models, rather than asserting a single “answer.” That lets you see how different assumptions drive different outcomes—and avoids pretending there’s one correct counterfactual.

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Model 1 — Seat Redistribution (No Vote Migration)

This asks: What if Parliament kept roughly the same size by reallocating Quebec’s seats to other provinces?

Assumption set

• Quebec’s 78 seats are redistributed proportionally to population among remaining provinces

• Party performance in each province remains exactly as observed

• First-past-the-post distortions remain

Step 1: New House size

Two realistic options:

Option 1A — Keep 343 seats

All 78 Quebec seats are redistributed.

Option 1B — Partial shrink

House reduced but not fully: e.g. 310 seats (common in comparative federations)

I’ll model Option 1A (343 seats) since it’s cleaner.

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Likely seat recipients

Most redistributed seats would go to:

• Ontario

• Alberta

• British Columbia

• Fast-growing Atlantic ridings

These are Conservative-leaning under FPTP, especially Alberta and rural Ontario.

Conservative advantage mechanism

• Conservatives already win many ridings by large margins

• Additional seats tend to be created in high-growth suburban/exurban areas

• Liberals are more vote-efficient nationally, but less so without Quebec

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Interpretation

• Conservatives likely win a clear majority, not just a technical one

• Liberals improve seat count but lose relative leverage

• NDP benefits slightly from urban redistribution but not enough to matter

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Model 2 — Vote Migration (Psychological & Strategic Effects)

Now we allow voters to react to Quebec’s departure.

This is the most politically realistic scenario.

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Key behavioral shifts to model

1. Liberal coalition fracture

Without Quebec:

• The Liberals lose their national unity / brokerage identity

• Western and Atlantic Liberal voters become more elastic

• Some strategic Liberal voters defect to NDP or Conservatives

2. Conservative consolidation

• Federalism question disappears

• Conservative messaging simplifies

• Higher turnout efficiency in Ontario & Prairies

3. NDP vote recovery

• Quebec had suppressed NDP strength post-2011

• Urban progressive votes outside Quebec consolidate more clearly

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Vote-swing assumptions (modest, not extreme)

Outside Quebec:

• Liberals: −2.5% to −4% vote share

• Conservatives: +1.5% to +2.5%

• NDP: +1% to +2%

• Greens: flat

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Interpretation

• Conservatives win a strong majority

• Liberals lose official-opposition dominance in narrative terms

• NDP regains relevance but remains structurally capped by FPTP

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Model 3 — Constitutional Shock Scenario

This is the high-impact counterfactual.

Assumptions

• Quebec secession causes:

  • Short-term economic uncertainty

  • Federal institutional renegotiation

  • National identity shock

• Election becomes a stability vs change referendum

Voter reaction pattern (historically consistent)

• Risk-averse voters consolidate around a single governing alternative

• Smaller parties get squeezed

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This mirrors:

• UK post-Scottish referendum effects (2015)

• Spain post-Catalonia crisis

• Canada itself post-1995 referendum dynamics

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