Neither of them seemed particularly excited to be there. At the end of their meeting, Justin Trudeau and François Legault had still not reconciled on the issue of immigration. The prime ministers of Canada and Quebec have instead passed the buck, with successive press briefings, engaging in a war of numbers and deadlines from which no one emerges a winner.
The premises of each being irreconcilable, the outcome of their tête-à-tête seemed inevitable. Indeed, François Legault and Justin Trudeau do not even agree on the number of temporary immigrants who are on Quebec soil (the first relies on estimates from Statistics Canada, while the second relies on the federal ministry of Immigration), or even on the proportion of them managed by their respective governments. Their definition of “emergency” also differs, with the measures promised by Justin Trudeau in the coming months being deemed insufficient by François Legault, who demanded immediate action.
However, the federal Prime Minister threw in ballast and 750 million of the billion dollars that Quebec was demanding. Mr. Trudeau also now recognizes that we must “reduce the disproportionate number of asylum seekers in Quebec.” To do this, it provides a mechanism for distributing these new arrivals to other provinces for the month of September, a tightening of the granting of visas in “high volume” countries (including India, above all) to starting this summer and the acceleration of work permit applications or referrals in the event of refusal. Without being allocated additional resources, on the other hand, this last part of its plan risks still encountering eternal administrative delays, with thousands of files being added every month to the already very heavy backlog.
The surge in these arrivals in Ontario – which now welcomes 50% of asylum seekers seeking refuge in Canada every month – is not unrelated to Justin Trudeau’s sudden desire to finally make changes to his immigration policy. Living in voting intentions, the Prime Minister cannot afford to upset the two largest provinces. Even less the only and last one, Quebec, where his party remains somewhat in the race, despite the systematic encroachment of its exclusive areas of jurisdiction.
The promised rebalancing in immigration must now materialize, and quickly, because François Legault – who hopes for a halving of federal reception – is right to deplore that it has already taken too long.
Justin Trudeau, on the other hand, is not wrong to note that the Quebec Prime Minister is careful not to tighten the reception of temporary immigrants where he could. Mr. Legault replies that Quebec needs these students as well as these workers in the regions or in areas affected by labor shortages. By summoning Ottawa to make such difficult decisions, the CAQ are cleverly avoiding them for the moment. However, it is not enough to blame the lack of nurses, teachers and housing on temporary immigrants to overcome shortages that have been plaguing for years.
As for the decline of French, the requirement for proficiency which will be imposed to renew the permits of temporary workers under the federal international mobility program is a “major gain”, as the CAQ themselves described it in March.
If Mr. Legault came away disappointed from his meeting with Mr. Trudeau, despite these positive responses to several of his requests (although they are not all dated or quantified), it is because he once more up against the limits of the federalist straitjacket. He will clearly not have full powers in immigration matters.
The preventive announcement of an “advisory committee on constitutional issues to increase the autonomy of Quebec within the Canadian federation” was therefore appropriate. Rather than brandishing a sectoral referendum which he no longer wants, Mr. Legault will now be able to stir up this new nationalist momentum likely to unearth, he hopes, new powers for Quebec hitherto unsuspected.
However, two avenues are available to the committee, which will be just as risky for it. If its experts do not detect new avenues of passage, the accusations of admission of failure will be difficult to refute. If these new powers have been neglected until now, François Legault will have to justify not having invoked them sooner.
The Caquists will respond that it was first necessary to carry out this exercise of constitutional exploration. But in government for six years, they will not be able to avoid justifying the fact that by dint of repeatedly coming up against the federalist wall, they have waited so long. Indeed, it was up to them, at the helm of Quebec, to demonstrate their autonomist nationalism.