On 12 August 2014, the caucus was reduced to three MPs when the Bloc's interim parliamentary leader, Jean-François Fortin, quit the party to sit as an independent saying that the Bloc Québécois he had joined no longer exists and that Beaulieu had destroyed its credibility. On 25 August 2014, former interim parliamentary leader and failed leadership contender André Bellavance also resigned, reducing the Bloc to two MPs – one of whom, Claude Patry, who had announced that he would not run for re-election. On 31 December 2014, the party's vice president, Annie Lessard, resigned after a personality conflict with leader Mario Beaulieu.