The Coalition avenir Québec (CAQ) persists in its objective of extracting more power from the federal government in immigration despite the end of inadmissibility decreed Wednesday by the Prime Minister of Canada, Justin Trudeau.
Posted at 2:29 p.m.
Defeated MPs and candidates in the new government gathered Thursday in Brossard, a suburb of Montreal, for their first post-election caucus following the party’s historic victory Monday night.
“I heard from Mr. Trudeau an acknowledgment that Quebec should have the necessary tools to function,” said the outgoing Minister responsible for Canadian Relations, Sonia LeBel, saying that “we can continue the discussions” .
On Thursday, however, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau closed the door on granting Quebec more powers over immigration. The province already has all the tools to choose the vast majority of immigrants arriving on its territory, he believes.
Justin Trudeau was thus trying to cut short any form of negotiations aimed at transferring new powers to Quebec in immigration, as Quebec Premier François Legault mentioned during the election campaign as a means of reversing the decline of French in the province. .
“We will not accept being answered no,” added Sonia LeBel later, in response to a question asked in English.
A nationalist government
For the outgoing Deputy Prime Minister, Geneviève Guilbault, the choice of Quebecers to send a majority government of the CAQ to the National Assembly, must be heard by “all federal parties”.
“We have just elected several more deputies. We form a nationalist government, Quebecers have again chosen a nationalist government, including these demands [qui sont] well-known,” she insisted.
During the election campaign in Quebec, François Legault raised the idea of holding a sectoral referendum on immigration to force the hand of the Trudeau government. The head of the CAQ wants to maintain the threshold of newcomers that Quebec welcomes each year at 50,000.
Currently, immigration is a jurisdiction shared between Quebec and Ottawa.
Recall that during the campaign, Mr. Legault made controversial remarks by making an awkward link between immigration and violence in Quebec. He then apologized.