Left to right: Lyne Parent of the AAPPQ, Robert Poëti, former minister for integrity in public procurement, and André Rainville of the AFG.
Lyne Parent had just stepped out of the subway station in Montreal when her cellphone rang. On this mid-August day in 2018, she could barely make out what the caller was saying. She quickly moved away from the screeches and squeals of buses to a quieter spot. Upon hearing the news, she felt relieved ? and content. In a matter of moments, a summer of angst gave way to cautious optimism. ?The hardest part was to keep the good news to myself for 24 hours because the government wanted to make the announcement itself,? recalls Parent, the executive director of Quebec?s association of private practice architects (AAPPQ). Parent had good reason to be pleased. In the middle of summer holidays, two underdogs had jointly mounted a successful advocacy campaign to stave off an effort by the Quebec government to quietly reintroduce lowest-bid contracting. Faced with public pressure, the Quebec government withdrew its controversial draft regulation on August 15 and established a framework to analyze and revise the way in which public contracts for professional services are awarded. ?There were not many people who believed we would succeed given the determination and will of the government to adopt the regulation,? says André Rainville, the president and CEO of Quebec?s association of engineering consulting firms (AFG).
The groundwork for a succes...