Legault doubles down on decline of French as Bill 96 is signed into law & More Trending News

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“Everyone has to concede there is a decline in French,” Legault advised reporters as he arrived for query interval on the National Assembly. “When we look at the statistics, the language most used in the home is in decline, the language most used at work is in decline.

“It becomes a question of time. If this decline continues, it will take how many years before French is not used a lot?”

Legault quoted authorities statistics displaying the quantity of individuals on the island of Montreal utilizing French within the office has gone from 59.5 per cent in 2011 to 56.8 per cent.

He stated the information is one cause his Coalition Avenir Québec authorities adopted Bill 96 to bolster the Charter of the French Language.

“There is an urgency to act,” the premier stated.

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Legault made the statements to justify his new marketing campaign to strain the federal authorities into surrendering extra powers over immigration to Quebec. Specifically, he needs the province to have management over the class of household unification, a request Ottawa has already denied.

At his get together’s coverage conference over the weekend, Legault stated immigration might be a key subject within the October basic election, and that getting extra energy is a query of survival for the Quebec nation.

“If we continue with a system where Ottawa picks these immigrants and only half speak French, in a matter of time we could become a Louisiana,” he stated on the conference.

At the identical time, the CAQ authorities has been making an attempt to ease the fears of the English-speaking neighborhood over Bill 96. It took out a full-page advert in Tuesday’s Montreal Gazette titled Bill 96: The Facts and stating “several falsehoods have circulated.”

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Pundits and critics have complained the advert doesn’t reply to the issues of the anglophone neighborhood.

But on Wednesday Legault re-tweeted a remark made by a citizen complaining in regards to the Gazette’s protection of the invoice. “Having to pay for full-page ads in a newspaper to respond to the disinformation in the same newspaper,” stated the tweet.

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All this comes as Legault is being accused by the opposition of inventing a disaster over immigration for political causes whereas Quebec heads into an election marketing campaign.

Liberal MNA Saul Polo, who was born in Santa Marta, Colombia, and moved to Quebec 30 years in the past, advised the legislature on Tuesday he “refused to accept the label that immigration is a threat to the Quebec nation.”

He stated it’s not the federal government’s enterprise if he chooses to talk Spanish at residence and French exterior. He was particularly irked to listen to Legault say Tuesday within the legislature that Polo’s success at integrating into Quebec society was an “anecdote,” and that the general downside stays.

“Being treated as an anecdote by the premier wounded me profoundly,” Polo advised reporters. “I and many Quebecers made all the necessary effort to integrate and become full citizens.”

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Legault stated he meant to say Polo is an instance and that the premier is extra involved with the worldwide state of affairs. Data exhibits fewer individuals are talking French within the residence and the development will proceed, he stated.

“The data we have, language spoken at home and the language of work, are important,” he stated. “I would like to add another statistic. So I have asked (minister of the French language) Simon Jolin-Barrette and his team for data on the language used in the public sector.

“What we are saying is, we want French to be the common language. Well, we have to look what is the language at home, what is the language at work, what is the language in the public sector. They go together.

“If there is nobody who speaks French at home, well, that means French will eventually disappear.”

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Legault grew irritated when pressed by a Gazette reporter to broaden on the difficulty of languages spoken at residence.

“Do you agree with me that if 50 years from now, nobody is speaking French at home, that the future of French wouldn’t be good? Do you agree with that? So you have your answer.”

He then left the room.

D’Arcy-McGee Liberal MNA David Birnbaum, the get together’s level individual for the English-speaking neighborhood, later reported listening to Legault make remarks about residents within the West Island within the legislature throughout the query interval that adopted the information convention.

“Shameful,” Birnbaum tweeted. “Just now, François Legault, off-micro(phone) but audible and twice, said: ‘C’est le West Island qui s’énerve!’ This was his outrageous response to our question-period intervention on his on-the-record attacks on Quebecers whose mother tongue is other than French.”

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Legault grew up on the West Island, in Ste-Anne-de-Bellevue.

The premier obtained a powerful rebuke from the Quebec Community Groups Network, the umbrella group for English-language organizations, which responded with its personal tweet.

“Premier François Legault — officially the minister responsible for relations with English-speaking Quebecers — is showing incredible disrespect for his constituency,” stated the tweet.

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Sparks have been already flying in query interval, with the opposition events ganging up on Legault for a second day in a row as a result of of his choice to wade into the emotional topic of language and immigration.

“If the premier thinks 14,000 people (the approximate number of family-unification immigrants per year) are going to lead us to Louisiana in a few years, it is because he is trapped in his ideology,” Québec solidaire co-spokesperson Gabriel Nadeau-Dubois fired throughout the ground at Legault.

“In the ideology of the premier, immigrants are a threat to French.”

Legault continued his offensive on the identical day Bill 96 turned law.

In a brief signing ceremony early Wednesday, Lt-Gov. J. Michel Doyon signed the invoice, which was adopted final week within the National Assembly.

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Jolin-Barrette stated Bill 96 will give Quebec the “tools it needs” to guard and promote French.

He stated some measures will take impact instantly, such as the creation of the Ministry of the French Language. Other measures, like these making use of to industrial indicators and francization necessities for small companies, will apply in three years.

The ceiling on enrolment in English CEGEPs will kick in subsequent 12 months, however the requirement to take extra French programs will come into impact in two years.

Within the subsequent 12 months, Jolin-Barrette will desk a brand new authorities linguistic coverage.

“There’s time to get things done correctly and we’re giving people time to adapt,” he advised reporters.

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