Here's an article I wrote in the Gazette two years ago about the exercise habits of our MNAs.
ey run for office just so they can sit. And sitting is just what many elected members of the National Assembly do. All day, Quebec's 125 MNAs remain seated in chairs during meetings, business lunches and car drives, leaving almost no time to hit the gym and develop rock solid lats and glutes.
In a province where almost half of the entire budget goes to the health sector -that's a cool $28 billion per year -one might imagine those who manage our health should make an effort to be muscular examples of fitness.
In recent decades, health issues have haunted the assembly, tragically cutting down some of Quebec's most promising provincial leaders. Premier Paul Sauve died at 52, just 100 days into his reign, Daniel Johnson Sr. only made it through half a mandate when he died at 53, Jean-Jacques Bertrand suffered a heart attack in office and died at 56. More recent titans Rene Levesque and Robert Bourassa only lived to 63 and 65, respectively.
Nowadays, a new generation of fitness-oriented provincial politicians prioritize their physical health, pushing themselves away from their desks to hit the gyms, ski hills and roads.
Labelle riding's Parti Quebecois MNA Sylvain Page, 49, is part of that new generation. The former race walker switched to running 18 years ago and is not considering letting up. "I keep a pair of
running shoes in my office, condo, house and car. I'm ready to go any time. I work out in my home gym every morning because running is the sport that gets you into shape the fastest, and I believe a healthy body makes for a healthy mind," Page says.
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| Sylvain Page |
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When he entered the provincial assembly in 2001, Page lamented the lack of a gym in the building. A long-standing proposal to build a $300,000 exercise facility had been shelved when elected officials believed the public would consider it too luxurious. So Page started eyeballing a room of about 20 by 20 feet that had previously housed a few mats and punching bags favoured by former assembly president and karate aficionado Pierre Charbonneau.
After a transformation of $30,000, the modest exercise room, which is open 24 hours a day to MNAs, now contains fitness machines and two showers. The gym attracts about 15 to 20 regulars. Many agree that cabinet minister Yolande James spends far more time working the abs and doing aerobics than any other official.
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| Yolande James |
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The Queen of the Assembly gym, according to many, is Quebec’s Minister of Families, Yolande James, 33, who’s in bed every night by eleven and hits treadmill six days a week at5:30 a.m. where she dashes for about 40 minutes at a brisk 8 miles an hour. “On the days I don’t do it I feel slower in the brain,” she says. “I just don’t feel as energetic if I miss. Running provides the energy to do important and challenging work and it’s the one time I have alone with myself. It’s important to have that time to clear my mind and concentrate on what’s coming in the day.”
James is also known for having healthy snacks strategically within reach as a way to beat the temptation to gorging on fast food but she also refrains from cajoling those with more slovenly ways. “It’s a personal thing but I’ve seen other colleagues get into exercising and they see that it’s a good feeling, they see it can become like a drug with all the endorphins flowing.”
Pierre Moreau, 52, Liberal whip from Chateauguay, was also instrumental in building that gym. He was negatively inspired by stories of old-time drinking traditions at the assembly. "I heard all the old stories. They used to call this building Parliament Hotel, in honour of all those MNAs who fell asleep here after drinking," he says. When he inherited Michel Morin's job as whip, Moreau also took on his predecessor's exercise habits. Morin had responded to heart issues by taking to the gym for a couple of hours each day.
Moreau believes his five-day-a-week treadmill-intensive workouts have made him a better politician. "I get more energy, focus and can really listen to questions. It just makes me a lot more efficient."
The importance of fitness in Canada's legislatures is not one that's considered particularly pressing outside of Quebec, where only Alberta houses a gym in its legislature, and it is described by an official as a "small room in the basement."
Provinces such as British Columbia give elected reps the same discount rate as provincial employees to attend public gyms.
Liberal MNA Geoff Kelley, 55, is sheepishly not a fan of hitting the gym. "When we are up Quebec City, the days are very long. We often we have a caucus at 7:30 and the days aren't done until
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| Geoff Kelley |
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sometimes 12 hours later," says Kelley, a father of five. "Once you've done all that, you don't have much energy left over to go for a walk. You're here with your suit and business shoes on."
In warmer months, Kelley plays 20 games in the outfield for a West Island baseball team, which made the playoffs this year, and he saddles up for the occasional long bike ride. But the winter grind takes its toll on his fitness. "It's a challenge to lead a healthy life. I'm just not a gym guy. I've tried to interest myself in the stationary bike, but never succeeded."
One health expert says that studies consistently demonstrate that fitness contributes to mental alacrity and could contribute to a better dialogue by diminishing the hostile bickering that sometimes plagues sessions of the assembly. "If we have pent up energy that's not being released, it will get released one way of another, often through anger," says David Siscoe, who runs several gyms in the Montreal area.
Exercise also reduces stress and Siscoe recommends compact workouts for overcharged politicians or anybody high on stress and short on time. He proposes 15-minute timed walks where one attempts to travel farther upon each voyage. He also suggests a quick series of five pushups, 10 squats, 15 sit ups done 10 times, which can be completed in 12 minutes. "I work with people with private jets and people on welfare. Everybody has 12 minutes in their day and all can reap tremendous benefits from that small amount of daily exercise."
Many MNAs see eating properly as the biggest obstacle to remaining a fit rep. "It's impossible to eat well in this job," says Taschereau's PQ MNA Agnes Maltais, 54. She laments that her fitness life is not what it was when she worked in theatre, played handball and badminton and ran in the morning, a practice that stopped when she damaged her shins. Maltais' diminished regime now includes snowshoeing and the occasional four-hour walk.
Emilien Pelletier, 64, who represents St. Hyacinthe for the PQ, also agrees that chowing down remains the enemy of the elected official. The MNA for St. Hyacinthe has completed several marathons and his son doubles as his trainer. He quit smoking but confesses to sinful eating. "Everybody tells me not to eat so much fast food," he says. "But I like to eat and I abuse that sometimes."
The allure of unhealthy snacking has seduced many a politician. "We spent a lot of time in meetings, not moving," says Rouyn Liberal Daniel Bernard, 51." I try to eat a lot of veggies and avoid fried foods, rice and pasta, but I have a weakness for snacks and sometimes just can't resist." The seven-year MNA uses the stationary bike at the gym but has ditched hard-knuckle sports for more recreational activities: cross-country skiing has gone downhill and jogging has been replaced by golf.
At least until the early '90s, MNAs who concerned themselves with staying fit were seen as oddballs, according to former MNA Neil Cameron. Politicians were given access to a gym at the Hilton Hotel and only a few, such as Equality Party leader Robert Libman, put it to use.
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| Neil Cameron |
Cameron suggests that the rising popularity in fitness at the assembly could also just be a reflection of larger society. "I never would have imagined how much Nautilus machines and gourmet coffee have spread in society at large, so maybe the MNAs of today are a more sober, muscular, caffeine-crazy bunch. I find this thought a bit alarming."
And not all MNAs believe that they have an obligation to be in any better shape than their constituents. "We're not extra-terrestrials," says Francois Gendron, Quebec's longest serving MNA, having spent 34 of his 65 years as an elected representative with the PQ. "We're a reflection of the population and I live a similar life to my constituents in Abitibi West."
Nevertheless, Gendron finds time to play tennis, golf and go rollerblading in the summer and both forms of skiing in the winter. The former cabinet minister has always made time for staying in shape. "It's not the time we have, it's the time we take," says Gendron, who confesses to having quit smoking "about 10 times."
Fellow former smoker Jacques Chagnon, 58, Liberal MNA for Westmount- Saint-Louis, kicked the butts 25 years ago when he entered the assembly. He's keen on golfing, hunting and fishing but also splashes in a pool three or four times a week, averaging between a kilometre or a mile, depending on how he's feeling about the metric system that day. "My doctor is also my good friend, we swim together," Chagnon says.
Then there are those like Liberal Pierre Reid, 62, whose bike riding and cross country skiing hobbies have been curtailed by real life. "I've slowed down a bit since my son was born in 2007, " he says. Reid now leans on a strict diet to keep his form. He avoids sugar, bread, pasta, flour, corn, rice and potatoes to keep in shape,
And just because you don't see your MNA at the gym or rollerblading madly around the local park does not mean they're not staying in shape. Some do their exercising in places that nobody can see. Liberal Francine Charbonneau, 48, who moved to Quebec from the Commission scolaire de Laval in 2008, stashes her collapsible treadmill under her bed and burns it up for up to half an hour every morning. Her son helps her train, but she has found that running for office is still easier than running for real. "I'm always out of breath sooner than I run out of energy," she says.
