Quebec premier's opening speech in national assembly nothing but a rehash, opposition parties say

Legault outlines priorities in opening speech Quebec Premier Francois Legault outlines his government's top priorities for the new legislative session, including protecting French.

Opposition parties were left "disappointed" Wednesday with François Legault's hour-and-15-minute inaugural speech in the national assembly that they say contained nothing new.

Reacting to the speech, the Quebec Liberal Party (QLP) said there were three issues in particular where their disappointment was "particularly strong."

"First, the premier continues to call the labour shortage good news, when, in fact, it is a catastrophe," said QLP interim leader Marc Tanguay.

"Second, he did not see fit to announce any new measures to help Quebecers fight the rising cost of living, merely repeating what is already known."

This is "clearly insufficient," according to Tanguay.

"The government has been in power for four years, the results are not there ... and in today's speech, we have not seen … any new measures," the interim leader said.

"Let's continue ... not to have results on the main issues," he said mockingly, referring to the election campaign slogan of the Coalition avenir Québec (CAQ), which was "Let's continue."

'SAME OLD SPEECH,' SAYS QUEBEC SOLIDAIRE

On the environment file, "it's the same old speech," according to Québec solidaire (QS).

"It's repeating that Quebec is already among the best. This is not false, except that we are the best among the worst,'' said the party's co-spokesperson, Gabriel Nadeau-Dubois.

"It is easy to say that we are better than the United States and Canada. They are oil-producing countries. It's as if the Montreal Canadiens were saying, 'I'm better than the BB atom in Pointe-Saint-Charles."

On the other hand, Legault has polished his language, but he continues to designate immigration as a threat to the Quebec nation, according to Nadeau-Dubois.

He continues to use the wrong indicators in the language debate, he added.

"What we need to debate is French as a language of use, as a language of work. It's not up to the premier to manage what language people speak when they tuck their kids in at night," the QS co-leader said.

In his speech, Legault expressed concern about the sharp decline in the use of French, particularly in Montreal, saying that the trend must be reversed.

In doing so, he "disavowed" his Bill 96, which was supposed to strengthen the protection of French, according to Parti Québécois (PQ) MNAs.

"We finally realize that it didn't work," said Pascal Bérubé, the MNA for Matane.

"This is a disavowal," said PQ Leader Paul St-Pierre Plamondon. "We will hope that beyond the declarations, we move forward in terms of public policy."

This report by The Canadian Press was first published in French on Nov. 30, 2022.