(Ottawa) “Always happy to defend my constituents”. Far from swallowing her misleading comments on Law 96, the elected liberal Emmanuella Lambropoulos reacted with these words to the sharing of an article where her remarks are substantiated – article which she has liked on Facebook.
Accused by the Bloc opposition of having raised a linguistic bugbear by telling the story of the grandmother of one of her constituents who was unable to obtain care in English since the adoption of Bill 96, she persisted and signed on Monday.
The anecdote she mentioned last Friday before the Standing Committee on Official Languages rebounded during question period in the House, where Mario Beaulieu, from the Bloc, asked the Minister of Official Languages, Ginette Petitpas Taylor, for an explanation.
“She claims that thousands of English speakers will lose access to health care [en anglais]. It’s totally ridiculous, he protested. Will the minister order her colleagues to stop disinformation? »
His interlocutor dodged. “I hope that we will have the cooperation of my colleagues since we want to pass this bill which will make a real difference in the lives of Canadians,” she simply replied.
She did not specify the color of the colleagues whose support she was hoping for. Right now, the Trudeau government is taking red, friendly fire in the process of studying the bill on the modernization of official languages, Bill C-13.
Emmanuella Lambropoulos and her colleagues Marc Garneau and Anthony Housefather, who do not sit on the parliamentary committee in charge of its examination, are showing up there these days in the hope of amending it, against the will of the government.
In terms of language, this is not the first time that MNA Lambropoulos, elected against all odds in a by-election in the riding of Saint-Laurent in 2017, contradicts the Liberal position (and, by the way, the facts ).
The former high school teacher was forced to resign from the language committee in 2020 after calling the decline of Molière’s language in Quebec a “myth”.
“Nonsense”
His release last Friday upset the conservative Joël Godin, vice-president of the committee.
“She used fear. What I understand from Bill 96 is that there is an obligation to serve people in their language. There may be a misunderstanding of the law, he pleads. This is probably an exceptional case. »
And in general, it is rather the opposite that is true, says the MP: “How many French-speaking Quebecers are bullied when they go to Montreal and are not able to communicate because it happens in English? “.
In the NDP, although we have “a certain uneasiness” with Bill 96, in particular with regard to its application for newcomers, the deputy leader, Alexandre Boulerice, nevertheless deplores the “false information » conveyed by the liberal.
“It’s just wrong what she said,” said the MP for Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie. That may scare some Anglophones in Montreal. It’s pretty concerning that she’s using that as a strategy. »
“She shows ignorance, really, about what is provided for by law. She should stop saying nonsense like that, especially since it’s not the first time she’s done that, ”concludes the NDP MP.
Solicited by The Pressthe office of Minister Ginette Petitpas Taylor had not reacted when publishing these lines, Monday, at the end of the day, no more than the office of the member for Saint-Laurent.
The Standing Committee on Official Languages continues its work on Bill C-13 on Tuesday.