François Legault does not pay much attention to the results of a Léger-The duty that support for the sovereignist project is growing in the Quebec population. “I don’t feel any appetite […] for a referendum,” the prime minister said Thursday.
According to data from a survey published in our pages on Wednesday, 38% of Quebecers still support the independence option, an increase of six percentage points compared to the last Léger-The duty conducted on this, in 2018. And that’s not all. Still according to the survey data, 48% of French-speaking Quebecers would vote “yes” to a referendum on sovereignty, compared to 41% who would vote “no”.
However, in the eyes of Prime Minister François Legault, who has repeated many times that the “appetite” for a referendum campaign was not there, the portrait does not move an inch. “I think it’s a legitimate project, which is supported by the Parti Québécois, among others. [PQ]. It is up to the Parti Québécois to promote it. We at the [Coalition avenir Québec]what we want is to defend the Quebec nation within Canada, ”he said during a press scrum held Thursday on the sidelines of a meeting with the mayor of Quebec, Bruno Merchant.
The PQ leader, Paul St-Pierre Plamondon, took advantage of the parliamentary break this week to make a European tour on independence. He notably met leaders of the Catalan and Scottish sovereigntist movements.
Support for the “yes” within his party is still healthy. Supporters of the PQ are – unsurprisingly – 85% in favor of the sovereignist option. But the idea of a Quebec-country also garners support from CAQ (42%) and solidarity (43%) members.
Never mind. “I don’t feel any appetite among the majority of the population for a referendum, even those who are for the ‘yes’,” Mr. Legault said on Thursday.
In June 2022, Mr. St-Pierre Plamondon had urged the Prime Minister of the Caquiste to make a federalist profession of faith, after Quebec had suffered a series of refusals in terms of immigration from the federal government. “We are a nationalist party, within Canada,” said Mr. Legault.
Then, again this week, the elected representative of the CAQ refused to launch a commission on the future of Quebec within the Canadian federation, despite a request to that effect from the PQ.