It's ironic that the very same people who took Quebec out of the Great Darkness does not wish a great project such as this to go forward, despite their saying otherwise.
A great project? You mean giving tens of millions of dollars to Quebecor? Again, this is NOT about building the arena, the deal was already in place BEFORE the whole Labeaume/Quebecor saga.
Labeaume/PKP changed the issue from being who was going to run the arena to wheter or not an arena is being built, but that is simply posturing in order to get their bill approved by the government.
It was announced before the Quebecor deal that an arena was going to be built with 100% public funds, $200-mil coming from the Province and the rest coming from the city through the sale of bonds. The city would then pay back the bonds by making money from naming rights and a management contract (rent).
Now, Labeaume decided that he was giving the naming rights and management contract to Quebecor without going through a bid process, which is probably illegal. To justify his position, he just states random things such as: Quebecor can get us an NHL team, Quebecor's deal is better than anything ever created in the world, if we don't get the deal with Quebecor then Bettman will laugh at us, and **** Montréal. Now, if Quebecor's offer is so generous, than why couldn't they see what Bell or whoever else had to offer? If there was no other offer on the table, then why aren't they more transparent in their dealings? Plus, if Quebecor is able to secure an NHL team, than their deal would automatically be worth much more than any other company that couldn't secure an NHL team.
There is NO reason why Quebecor couldn't win a regular bidding process if they were really the only game in town capable of bringing in an NHL team. Then why not do it the right way??? Labeaume's only answer to that is that this is an urgent matter, but is it really? The building can still be built without having those naming rights sold yet.
Again, this is NOT about building an arena with public funds. The financing is already in place and it was already accepted by both the provincial and municipal government. It's not because the Quebecor deal isn't legal that the arena construction is illegal, and it's not because Labeaume can't give a contract to his buddy that the arena can't be built. Unless of course Labeaume was already full of it when he declared that they were building the arena without a private partner and that he already knew that he would give it to Quebecor.
With this law, the government won't have to answer to anyone while handing out contracts. Anybody not from Quebec City realizes how completely ludicrous it is, yet people in Quebec don't realize the impact this could have not just regarding to this deal, but to whatever future dealing the city wants to do in the future.