MONTREAL - There were no long waiting times Wednesday when Quebec's political party leaders began assigning blame for the problems in the province's health-care system.
It was clear to Premier Jean Charest that the fault lies mainly with Parti Quebecois Leader Pauline Marois and the previous PQ governments in which she served.
However, Marois insisted that Charest is to blame, having squandered his time in government since 2003 by not keeping promises to ease emergency room crowding and cut wait times.
"He did not solve the problems," Marois said in Longueuil, Que.
The recriminations began flying as a poll suggested that Quebecers believe health care, and not the economy, is the No. 1 issue in the campaign for the Dec. 8 election.
Campaigning in the Beauce region, Charest said his government has been working for the last five years to "clean up the mess" left behind by Marois when she was a cabinet minister.
Marois, he insisted, "is the source of the problems we're living with in the health-care system."
Charest pointed out that Marois, who served in key roles as health and finance minister in various PQ governments, was responsible for thousands of doctors and nurses being encouraged to take early retirement in the 1990s, leaving the system strapped.
The premier said his government has increased admissions to medical schools by 20 per cent and noted that 92 per cent of Quebecers who need surgery have it done in less than six months.
Marois also faced criticism from within her own party Wednesday as former legislature member Jean-Claude St-Andre announced he is quitting the PQ because he was denied the nomination in his old riding.
He said Marois had been undemocratic in rejecting his candidacy in favour of former Quebec Green party leader Scott McKay. St-Andre also refused to follow the decision to put sovereignty on the back burner for the time being.
Guy Rainville, the new leader of the Quebec Greens, announced his party's platform on Wednesday, calling for an overhaul of the electoral system to make it more democratic. Among his proposals is a fixed date for elections.
Elsewhere, Action democratique du Quebec Leader Mario Dumont continued to focus on education, sayin the province's system has been "programmed to fail."
Speaking on the football field of a private school in Quebec City, the Opposition leader said the high dropout rate and behavioural and learning problems experienced by Quebec students prove his theory.
He said students are often promoted to higher grades before they are ready.
The problem "is not biological or genetic," but attributable to "errors" in the system, he said.
Dumont also revived a promise to abolish school boards in the province.
Dumont's efforts seem to have found an ally in the Federation des syndicats de l'enseignement teachers' union, which echoed many of his concerns and called for better funding for primary and secondary schools.
Marois, Dumont and Charest will get a chance to square off face-to-face on Nov. 25 now that an agreement has been reached on a format for a televised debate.
A spokesman for the broadcast consortium said the new format will provide a more "dynamic" show for viewers.
Charest had been the holdout during the debate negotiations because he objected to proposed changes in the format.
The organizers had wanted to copy the leaders' debate in the federal election, where party chiefs confronted each other around a boardroom-style table. Pundits who watched that debate said it put Prime Minister Stephen Harper at a disadvantage because his rivals were able to gang up on him.
Charest wanted the Quebec debate to follow its traditional format with one-on-one encounters by leaders standing behind podiums.
The approved format for the Quebec debate will have the leaders sitting around a table but there will be some one-on-one sparring.
Marois also announced that a PQ government would invest $3.5 billion in improvements to public transit around the Montreal area.
The PQ leader criticized the public and private sector partnerships that have been embraced by the Liberals for large projects.
She said she would find the money for the transit improvements amid funding already announced by the government for infrastructure refurbishing.
The PQ's interest in transport was echoed by the Quebec solidaire party, which made similar promises but allocated only $1.2 billion in funding.
