Note: Gustave Francq (1871 – 1952), typographer and union activist. The following text presents a new party known as the Labour Party. According to Francq, why can’t either the Liberal Party or the Conservative Party represent the working class ?

Extract:

“The Labour Party is made up of a group of citizens who believe that there are no differences between the guiding principles and the programme of the Liberals and the Conservatives. This group also believes the more things change, the more they remain the same!

When the Liberals are in power, they become conservative in their actions and when the Conservatives are in opposition, they become liberal in their dialogue.

All governments that have taken power since Confederation have only acted in the best interests of one class only-the capitalist and bourgeois class. Ignoring promises during electoral campaigns, they have managed to sell our national heritage, used our water resources to make themselves the richest and most powerful monopolies and trusts. They have managed to make the proletariat even poorer, so their worth can grow from shares from this company and they can have the best of all worlds.

…
Comrades, do not hesitate to join the Labour Party. It is yours, and by working for it, you are working for yourselves. The reforms it is working for are in your best interests, and the day this party has representatives in all parliaments will be the day the Sun shines brightly on our emancipation which will not be far away, and peace and happiness will reign on Earth.”

Source of extract: Free translation of Gustave Francq, Le Parti ouvrier, septembre 1908. Cité dans Yvan Lamonde et Claude Corbo, Le rouge et le bleu : Une anthologie de la pensée politique au Quebec de la Conquête à la Révolution tranquille, Montréal, PUM, 1999, p. 313-314.