“The absent are always wrong,” pleads the Conservative Party of Quebec (PCQ), which invites Liberal leader Dominique Anglade to participate in a debate in English during the next election campaign, even if Prime Minister François Legault refuses to be there.
According to the leader of the PCQ, Éric Duhaime, the English-speaking community of Quebec deserves to have its debate to address the issues that are dear to it, in particular questions of health, education and languages.
The political parties cannot stop there after a consortium of English-language media decided to cancel, on Friday, its debate scheduled for September 20 due to the withdrawal of Mr. Legault and that of the leader of the Parti Québécois (PQ) , Paul St-Pierre Plamondon.
The consortium had explained that without the presence of all the main parties, it would be impossible to present a “fair and informative” debate.
But according to Mr. Duhaime, it is not up to the English-speaking population to pay for the choice of certain parties. He believes that the formations which wish it should have the chance to debate in English.
At least one English-language media would have told the leader of the PCQ that he would be ready to organize a debate in English without the presence of the leader of the Coalition avenir Québec (CAQ), but that the leader of the Liberal Party should at least be Of the game.
If Ms. Anglade agrees to participate, the organizers would be ready to launch new poles with all the parties, including the PQ and the CAQ, if they wish to reconsider their initial decision.
Friday, the press secretary of Mr. Legault had indicated that the preparation for debates takes a lot of time, and that the Prime Minister had already committed to cross swords with the other leaders on the airwaves of TVA and Radio -Canada, in French.
Mr. Duhaime disagrees with this argument, as he says that after preparing for two debates, the additional time spent preparing for the debate in English would not be so substantial.
He instead accused the Prime Minister of wanting to limit the debates in the run-up to the elections in which he is a big favourite. Mr. Duhaime also recalled that Mr. Legault participated in a debate in English during the 2018 election campaign.
According to the leader of the PCQ, the opposition parties could even take advantage of Mr. Legault’s absence, since they would thus have more visibility, which they have had difficulty obtaining in recent years due to of the pandemic.