The economy, immigration and the French language featured prominently in the first leaders’ debate of the campaign in Quebec, featuring a lively, sometimes cacophonous exchange.
The TVA network’s head-to-head model breaks the debate into mini-debates where one leader faces off against another. The quick exchanges led to some scathing one-liners.
Coalition Avenir Québec leader Francois Legault defended several aspects of his time as premier, including the revamped French-language law known as Bill 96, his government’s handling of the pandemic and whether it has done enough to address worsening labor shortages.
Three of the five parties voted in favor of Bill 96, with the Liberals and the Parti Québécois rejecting it for opposing reasons.
It has since become a campaign issue, with Québec Solidaire spokesman Gabriel Nadeau-Dubois saying he would change it and Parti Québécois leader Paul Saint-Pierre Plamondon arguing it doesn’t go far enough. Quebec Conservative Party leader Eric Duhaime said he would reject it and write a new law.
During the debate, Liberal leader Dominic Anglad came under fire for his previous positions in favor of the bill.
Duhaime spoke in English with Anglade about Bill 96, although the debate was held in French.
“In fact you betrayed the English inhabitants of Quebec on this matter,” said Duhaime. Anglad countered that Duhaime was saying one thing to English-speaking voters and another to Francophones.
Duhaime denied that and said he wants to position himself as a center-right alternative to the Liberals for English-speaking Quebecers and that after Oct. 3, Quebec will enter a new political reality in which sovereignty is on the back burner.
Liberal leader Dominic Anglad greets supporters as he arrives for the leaders’ debate. (Paul Chiasson/The Canadian Press)
“The two old parties – the ‘Yes’ team and the ‘No’ team – are below 10 percent. We’re entering a new paradigm, and I think English speakers want to be a part of this new political reality,” Duhaime said.
Although the topics of the debate ran the gamut, the bottom line seemed to be immigration – which often came up in conversations about protecting the French language and labor shortages.
Nadeau-Dubois challenged Duheim after the Conservative leader said his party would favor immigrants with “Western values”.
“You’re suggesting that there are immigrants who are against these values,” said Nadeau-Dubois, who added that Québec Solidaire wants to “regionalize” immigration in the province and better fund French courses for newcomers.
Both Nadeau-Dubois and Anglad accused Legault of being negative every time he talks about immigration. While most parties, except the PQ, support accepting more permanent immigrants to the province, the CAQ says it will limit the number of newcomers to 50,000 a year.
Legault repeated what he said in an apology he made last week after getting campaign comments to stop citing “extremism” and “violence” as a reason to limit immigration to Quebec.
“Immigration is an asset for Quebec. I’m proud,” he said, repeating his apologetic tweet after the comments. “But how do we stop the decline of French? Doesn’t that worry you?’
Québec Solidaire spokesperson Gabrielle Nadeau-Dubois holds a Greenpeace poster as she arrives for the leaders’ debate in Montreal. (Paul Chiasson/The Canadian Press)
Leaders name controversial book
A question about academic freedom by moderator Pierre Bruno quickly turned into a debate about whether it’s okay to say the French N-word in the public sphere.
Plamondon argues that the risk of offending people should not impede democratic debate.
“What kind of society do we live in if we can’t name certain books?” the PQ leader said. This summer, CBC/Radio-Canada apologized after a complaint about repeated use of the N-word in a 2020 Radio-Canada program.
The anchor and columnist mentioned the firing of a Concordia University professor who quoted the title of a famous book by Pierre Vallier that contained the N-word.
“It’s not about banning words. It’s normal for societies to change,” Nadeau-Dubois said.
“But can we name [those books]?” asked Bruno.
Quebec Party leader Paul Saint-Pierre Plamondon said academic freedom is under threat in the province. (Paul Chiasson/The Canadian Press)
Plamondon had previously spoken the book’s name, including the N-word, claiming it was about the history of Quebecers — and prompted Nadeau-Dubois to say so as well.
Later in the debate, leaders were asked to discuss systemic racism, a concept that Legault and the CAQ refused to say existed in Quebec society.
Anglade, who is the first black woman to head a major political party in the province, called her tenure “a failure for local communities,” referring to what happened to Joyce Echaquan.
“Words matter. People who are victims of systemic racism, who are stopped more often, it affects their lives,” she said, noting that Lego did not adopt the Joyce Principle, a series of measures drawn up by indigenous leaders after Echaquan died.
Labor shortages, economy and taxes
Another difficult exchange between Anglade and Legault concerned labor shortages.
The Liberal leader said Lego had failed to create any solutions to the shortage in his four years as prime minister. She said her daughter had four different teachers last year because the workers, including educators and nurses, were so tired.
Lego said wages have increased under his tenure. “Workers are happy, workers are happy,” he said, adding that Quebec has closed the wealth gap with Ontario.
“The problem today is that we don’t have bus drivers; we have no teachers; we have no nurses. We’re missing people in all sectors of the economy in Quebec, and that affects every region of the province, and you want to say that’s good news,” said Anglad.
Conservative leader Eric Duhaime has come under fire from opponents for his lack of environmental proposals. (Paul Chiasson/The Canadian Press)
Taxes were another hot topic in the economy. Legault and Duhaime took aim at QS’s proposed 15 percent tax on high-polluting vehicles such as SUVs, calling it the “orange tax.”
Duhaime said QS has a tax “every time there’s a problem. It’s like a tax strip.”
Nadeau-Dubois quickly responded, accusing Duhaime of being “on another planet” regarding the reality of environmental issues. “You should run for governor of Texas,” he said.
Liberal leader Dominique Anglade also accused Duhaime of disregarding the environment with his proposal for a platform to exploit Quebec’s hydrocarbons.
“You want to take us back to the 1950s,” she said, after which Duhaime accused Anglad of being a demagogue.
Despite the fact that much of Lego’s tenure took place during the COVID-19 pandemic, health care did not figure prominently in the debate.
One of the most memorable moments was when Duheim said that Lego had been too strict with his government’s measures against COVID.
“You were the worst prisoner on the continent,” said Duhaime. The Lego government has imposed a curfew twice since 2020.
Legault accused Duheim of using the pandemic for partisan purposes and said he was the only party leader to do so.
“To win votes you didn’t want to back measures, all the time everyone was rowing in one direction,” the CAQ leader said. “You shot the bottom of the boat.”
1st debate for 4 out of 5 leaders
The debate was the first contest as party leader for four of the five participants. As a starter, Lego was the only one with experience – and a target on his back.
“The other four leaders attacked me a lot, that’s normal,” Lego told reporters afterwards. – I expected it.
Lego told reporters that he considers the debate important because it shows that Québec Solidaire’s platform is not realistic, especially when it comes to reducing greenhouse gas emissions.
CAQ leader Francois Legault answers questions after the leaders’ debate in Montreal on Thursday. (Paul Chiasson/The Canadian Press)
Québec Solidaire had 10 MNAs when the election was called.
Nadeau-Dubois said he “wants to make it clear that the alternative to the CAQ is Québec Solidaire.”
Liberal leader Anglad said he “speaks from the heart to explain that there is another way, not only the one proposed by Francois Legault, which unites instead of dividing”.
Duhaime said he felt he had “succeeded in presenting the ideas of the Conservative Party to those who don’t know us”.
Plamondon, who has been leader of the Parti Québécois for two years, said he was proud of what he had contributed to the debate. “It’s what I think, the ideas that interest me.”
A second French debate on Radio-Canada will be held on September 22. Unlike 2018, this election campaign will not have a debate in English.
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