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QUEBEC

Gérard Deltell was a young man of 17 in CEGEP when he bought his first membership card in the then Progressive Conservative Party of Canada.

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That was 1981. Joe Clark was leader followed by Brian Mulroney and Conservative fortunes in the province did not seem nearly as bleak as they do now, with a mere five seats out of 75 and an election six months away.

Enter Deltell, a natural politician with the gift for gab and his eye on the bigger prize: selling the Conservative brand — not only in his new political home of Louis-Saint-Laurent — but in a province where it’s far from a winner.

The proof of his pedigree was in his pocket: the original membership card which he proudly displayed.

“Je suis un bleu, un vrai bleu, un vieux bleu,” Deltell said Tuesday using the old language of Quebec’s conservatives at a news conference to confirm he’s quitting Quebec politics to run federally. “I am coming home and I am very happy.”