Québec Solidaire leads Quebec's main political parties when it comes to gender parity — half of its candidates are women.

The Parti Québécois is in second place with 37 per cent female candidates, followed by the Liberals at 28 per cent and the Coalition Avenir Québec at 23 per cent.

Mireille Paquet, a political scientist at Concordia University, says some parties still see it as a risk to run women in some of their key ridings.

"Right now all the parties are trying are trying to achieve as much gain as possible, so I think the agenda of women's representation in electoral politics kind of took the back seat to the general need to win," Paquest says.

The last Quebec election campaign made history with the most female candidates ever — a total of 254.

The total for this year will be released after this Saturday — the deadline for candidates to enter the race.