Union Montreal (french: Union Montréal) is an inactive
municipal
A municipality is usually a single administrative division having corporate status and powers of self-government or jurisdiction as granted by national and regional laws to which it is subordinate.
The term ''municipality'' may also mean the go ...
political party
A political party is an organization that coordinates candidates to compete in a particular country's elections. It is common for the members of a party to hold similar ideas about politics, and parties may promote specific ideological or p ...
in
Montreal
Montreal ( ; officially Montréal, ) is the second-most populous city in Canada and most populous city in the Canadian province of Quebec. Founded in 1642 as '' Ville-Marie'', or "City of Mary", it is named after Mount Royal, the triple ...
,
Quebec
Quebec ( ; )According to the Canadian government, ''Québec'' (with the acute accent) is the official name in Canadian French and ''Quebec'' (without the accent) is the province's official name in Canadian English is one of the thirtee ...
,
Canada
Canada is a country in North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering over , making it the world's second-largest country by tot ...
. It was the governing party in the city from 2001, when it won its first election under mayor
Gérald Tremblay
Gérald Tremblay (born September 20, 1942) is a former Canadian politician and businessman who served as mayor of Montreal from 2002 until his resignation in 2012. He also served as president of the Montreal Metropolitan Community. Before b ...
CTV News
CTV News is the news division of the CTV Television Network in Canada. The name ''CTV News'' is also applied as the title of local and regional newscasts on the network's owned-and-operated stations (O&Os), which are closely tied to the national ...
, November 14, 2012. Since 2013, it has no longer been politically active.
Origins
Union Montreal was originally established as the ''Montreal Island Citizens Union'' (''MICU'', french: Union des citoyens et des citoyennes de l’Île de Montréal or UCIM) in the aftermath of the province-wide municipal merger of 2001 and not long before the municipal election of that same year. It was the product of a merger between the Montreal Citizens' Movement (RCM) and a group of suburban politicians who backed Gérald Tremblay for mayor.
Electoral performance
Tremblay was the party's first mayoral candidate and was elected with 49% of the vote over incumbent Pierre Bourque. He was re-elected in 2005 with 54% of the vote against the same candidate, and again in 2009 over
Vision Montreal
Vision Montreal (french: Vision Montréal or VM) was a municipal political party in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. It was founded in 1994 and dissolved in April 2014. Between 2001 and 2013 it formed the official opposition on Montreal City Council.
...
's
Louise Harel
Louise Harel (born April 22, 1946) is a Quebec politician. In 2005 she served as interim leader of the Parti Québécois following the resignation of Bernard Landry. She was also interim leader of the opposition in the National Assembly of Qu ...
Richard Bergeron
Richard Bergeron (born 1955) is a Canadian politician and former Montreal city councillor. He founded Projet Montréal, a municipal political party, and was its leader until 2014. He was the party's mayoralty candidate in the 2005, 2009 and 201 ...
.
Change of name
In May 2007, Tremblay announced that the party would take its current name: Union Montreal. He also unveiled a new party logo. Instead of the yellow and blue logo used by the party from 2001 to 2007, a new multicolored symbol that represents Montreal's diversity would take place. The new label consisted of five vertical stripes (blue, green, brown, yellow and pink), each bearing one of the letters of the word ''UNION''.
Tremblay crisis
During a hearing at the
Charbonneau Commission
The Commission of Inquiry on the Awarding and Management of Public Contracts in the Construction Industry (french: Commission d'enquête sur l'octroi et la gestion des contrats publics dans l'industrie de la construction, also known as the Charbonn ...
on October 1, 2012, construction industry contractor Lino Zambito alleged that Union Montreal received a sum equivalent to three per cent of the value of sewerage rehabilitation contracts awarded by the City of Montreal to a
mafia
"Mafia" is an informal term that is used to describe criminal organizations that bear a strong similarity to the original “Mafia”, the Sicilian Mafia and Italian Mafia. The central activity of such an organization would be the arbitration of d ...
-linked
cartel
A cartel is a group of independent market participants who collude with each other in order to improve their profits and dominate the market. Cartels are usually associations in the same sphere of business, and thus an alliance of rivals. Mos ...
.
On October 30, 2012, a former Union Montreal party organizer alleged that Mayor Tremblay was involved in illegal financing with the mafia. He claimed that Tremblay knew of these dubious financial practices and did not want to be made aware of them. These statements caused a series of negative reactions from the spokespeople of all the provincial political parties.
Following the allegations, Tremblay announced that he would be taking a few days off. On November 5, 2012, Tremblay announced that he was resigning as mayor, and was leaving politics. Following his resignation, Union Montreal councillors
Marvin Rotrand
Marvin Rotrand (born 1951) is a former Canadian politician, last sitting as an independent. He previously served as a member of Montreal City Council, representing the district of Snowdon. Rotrand served on Montreal city council from 1982 until ...
,
Christian Dubois
Christians () are people who follow or adhere to Christianity, a monotheistic Abrahamic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus Christ. The words ''Christ'' and ''Christian'' derive from the Koine Greek title ''Christós'' (Χρισ ...
,
Daniel Bélanger
Daniel Bélanger (born December 26, 1961) is a Canadian singer-songwriter. His music is eclectic, inspired by alternative rock, folk and electronic music, sometimes humorous, sometimes wistful.
Biography
In middle 1983, he founded the band Hu ...
Frank Venneri
Frank Venneri is a politician in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. He served on the Montreal city council from 1986 to 1990, was re-elected in 1998, and has been returned to council in every election since then. Venneri is an independent councillor.
Pri ...
all left the party to sit as independents. Seven more city and borough councillors resigned in February 2013, including the entire borough council of
Anjou Anjou may refer to:
Geography and titles France
* County of Anjou, a historical county in France and predecessor of the Duchy of Anjou
**Count of Anjou, title of nobility
*Duchy of Anjou, a historical duchy and later a province of France
**Duk ...
Mayor of Montreal
The mayor of Montreal is head of the executive branch of the Montreal City Council. The current mayor is Valérie Plante, who was elected into office on November 5, 2017, and sworn in on November 16. The office of the mayor administers all ci ...
CTV News
CTV News is the news division of the CTV Television Network in Canada. The name ''CTV News'' is also applied as the title of local and regional newscasts on the network's owned-and-operated stations (O&Os), which are closely tied to the national ...
, November 16, 2012. However, Deschamps was defeated 31 to 29 by Applebaum, who pledged to run a non-partisan coalition council in which members of all parties, as well as the bloc of independents, would share seats on the
Montreal Executive Committee The Montreal Executive Committee (french: Comité exécutif de Montréal) is the executive branch of the municipal government of Montreal, Quebec, Canada. The committee reports directly to city hall and is responsible for generating documents such a ...
Canoe
A canoe is a lightweight narrow water vessel, typically pointed at both ends and open on top, propelled by one or more seated or kneeling paddlers facing the direction of travel and using a single-bladed paddle.
In British English, the ter ...
, June 18, 2013 and was succeeded by another temporary mayor that was not from Union Montreal.
On May 9, 2013, the party declared its intention to apply for dissolution, with the remaining members becoming independents. In the runup to the 2013 municipal election campaign, several of its former members rallied around the candidacy of
Denis Coderre
Denis Coderre (born July 25, 1963) is a Canadian politician from Quebec. Coderre was the member of Parliament for the riding of Bourassa from 1997 until 2013, and was the Immigration minister from 2002 to 2003 and became the mayor of Mont ...
Union Montreal's initial plan to apply for dissolution was withdrawn by September 2013, as it decided to stay in existence until the resolution of the
Charbonneau commission
The Commission of Inquiry on the Awarding and Management of Public Contracts in the Construction Industry (french: Commission d'enquête sur l'octroi et la gestion des contrats publics dans l'industrie de la construction, also known as the Charbonn ...
TVA
The Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) is a Federal government of the United States, federally owned electric utility corporation in the United States. TVA's service area covers all of Tennessee, portions of Alabama, Mississippi, and Kentucky, an ...
Radio-Canada
The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (french: Société Radio-Canada), branded as CBC/Radio-Canada, is a Canadian public broadcaster for both radio and television. It is a federal Crown corporation that receives funding from the government. ...
, September 25, 2013
In November 2013, a Quebec appeals court ruled that the party could continue to exist."Union Montréal obtient un sursis" ''
Le Devoir
''Le Devoir'' (, "Duty") is a French-language newspaper published in Montreal and distributed in Quebec and throughout Canada. It was founded by journalist and politician Henri Bourassa in 1910.
''Le Devoir'' is one of few independent large-c ...
Le Devoir
''Le Devoir'' (, "Duty") is a French-language newspaper published in Montreal and distributed in Quebec and throughout Canada. It was founded by journalist and politician Henri Bourassa in 1910.
''Le Devoir'' is one of few independent large-c ...
'', February 11, 2015 The party is no longer active politically.