As one other ballot exhibits the CAQ trailing the Parti Québécois, ministers have large initiatives on their agenda for the brand new session that begins Tuesday.
Article content material
QUEBEC — For Premier François Legault, 2023 was a 12 months he would slightly neglect.
However 2024 is an opportunity to strive, once more, for a recent begin in a second mandate.
Article content material
In a basic “that was then, that is now” second seasoned politicians are so good at, final week Legault refused to even record the various distractions he himself has described as the explanations his authorities obtained sidetracked final 12 months.
Commercial 2
Article content material
“One of the simplest ways to maintain oneself distant from distractions is just not title them,” he stated Thursday at a information convention wrapping up a two-day Coalition Avenir Québec caucus in Sherbrooke.
“I’m not going to rename them. The whole lot has been stated.”
He was even clearer in English.
“I need us to focus on our priorities,” he stated. “So neglect concerning the sideshows.”
He included himself on the record of politicians who need to do higher. Some doubt Legault’s sudden curiosity in self-discipline and cohesion, expressed on the caucus, will final. Political observers recall he pledged in 2021 to be extra Zen. It didn’t final lengthy.
However because the Nationwide Meeting prepares to renew sitting Tuesday — it’s the CAQ authorities’s sixth 12 months in workplace — the main target shall be on staying on message and placing into motion the various controversial reforms the CAQ steered into regulation in 2023 in well being and training.
Will or not it’s sufficient to get the get together out of the doghouse of public opinion in time for the 2026 election? Will Quebecers really feel a distinction in providers? This stays to be seen.
A Pallas Knowledge/Qc125/L’actualité ballot launched Monday exhibits the Parti Québécois 11 factors forward of the CAQ because the 12 months kicks off.
Commercial 3
Article content material
Headline Information
Article content material
Commercial 4
Article content material
It’s clear Quebecers shall be on the lookout for some signal of hope after months of congestion in emergency wards and struggles to search out sufficient lecturers for school rooms.
A December Léger ballot, in reality, exhibits almost one Quebecer in two (44 per cent) is offended concerning the deterioration within the high quality of public providers within the province. That explains the widespread assist for the strike actions of Quebec’s 600,000-member public sector final month.
What shall be completely different within the authorities? For one factor, Legault and plenty of of his ministers and employees arrive on the legislature Tuesday rested after a vacation break. Legault — who had not been seen in public since Dec. 20 till the CAQ caucus in Sherbrooke — vacationed in Mexico, which explains the 66-year-old premier’s new tan and vitality.
At a CAQ cocktail get together in Sherbrooke Wednesday night, Legault, who seemed like a crushed man in December, appeared his outdated self, attempting to get his mojo again with a campaign-style speech.
He joked the get together holds six out of the seven Townships seats.
“We’ll need to do higher subsequent time,” he quipped as his ministers nervously sipped wine. The phrase within the hall on the caucus was that they’re all on Legault’s watch record now that he had dominated out a cupboard shuffle to kick off the brand new 12 months, a standard transfer of governments searching for renewal.
Commercial 5
Article content material
The ministers might want to pull up their socks.
Legault advised the gang the sort of change his authorities tried to do in 2023 through such controversial legal guidelines as Invoice 15, overhauling the health-care system and organising Santé Québec, and Invoice 23 on training governance weren’t a straightforward promote. Individuals by nature resist change.
He insisted that is the sort of drugs Quebec wants.
“In case you don’t change the recipe, you find yourself with the identical unhealthy cake,” he advised the gang.
He used a brand new line of assault, heaping abuse on the three opposition events within the legislature — the Liberals, Québec solidaire and the PQ — who challenged Payments 15 and 23. They argued the laws was so rushed and flawed, somebody needed to say one thing.
Legault’s political spin, nevertheless, is that they have been obstructing.
“What we’ve got earlier than us is the trio of the established order,” he stated. “Quebecers have a selection: the trio of the established order or our staff of change.”
However for all his discuss of avoiding distractions, Legault has his work minimize out attempting to maintain 89 MNAs and the cupboard on observe. Conditions pop up. The present difficulty dogging the CAQ are allegations that at the very least two MNAs solicited donations to the CAQ get together treasury from municipal officers in return for entry to cupboard ministers.
Commercial 6
Article content material
Legault has stated mayors do not need to pay to have entry to ministers, however on Monday Presse Canadienne reported mayors have contributed a complete of $100,000 to the CAQ since 2021.
Legault’s ministers, nonetheless, have loaded agendas in 2024:
Well being Minister Christian Dubé: Dubé has to enact the reforms to the well being system included in Invoice 15, which he says will enhance providers. His first job is to pick out a CEO and managers for the brand new Santé Québec well being company, which can handle the system.
Power Minister Pierre Fitzgibbon: The minister who appears to be in every single place within the media, Fitzgibbon will desk a long-awaited invoice on vitality consumption, charge constructions and electrical manufacturing. He can even stay entrance and centre within the debate over extra personal manufacturing of energy.
Transport Minister Geneviève Guilbault: In step with the federal government pattern of making separate companies to do the work ministries appear unable to do, Guilbault will desk a invoice to handle the creation of enormous public transit initiatives. Expectations are excessive, given the drama final 12 months over Quebec Metropolis’s shelved tramway undertaking and a undertaking for Montreal’s east finish.
Commercial 7
Article content material
Finance Minister Eric Girard: The minister is going through a really advanced funds course of this 12 months, contemplating Quebec’s stagnating financial system and elevated spending to pay for public-sector wage will increase. He has been pressured to revise his forecasts down twice and has used up all the $6.5-billion rainy-day fund he included within the 2023-24 funds. He could need to delay the return to balanced guides.
Treasury Board President Sonia LeBel: The province’s chief bean counter is anticipated to rework herself into Dr. No this 12 months. She has to inform ministers there isn’t a more money mendacity round. Legault himself has spoken concerning the want for monetary rigour, however balks at using the phrase austerity.
Labour Minister Jean Boulet: Boulet introduced ultimately week’s CAQ caucus that he will desk a invoice this week reforming labour practices, coaching and administration within the building trade. The reform is anticipated to pit a authorities promising to hurry up the creation of latest properties and hydro initiatives in opposition to the imaginative and prescient of building labour unions.
Minister of Canadian Relations and the French Language Jean-François Roberge: After tabling new rules tightening up business signal guidelines in January, Roberge is anticipated to current extra parts of his motion plan to reverse the decline of French this winter. Authorities insiders have been saying the plan shall be far much less sweeping than anticipated as a result of most of the parts are already in place.
Commercial 8
Article content material
Legault additionally used the vacation interval to tinker together with his employees, the so-called internal circle. Adviser and speech-writer Stéphane Gobeil has been moved to the function of director of strategic planning.
In a uncommon transfer, Legault has added one new individual to his staff of advisers: Daniel Zizian, who launched himself to the media ultimately week’s caucus. Legault and Zizian, 66, have identified one another for 50 years, attending CEGEP collectively. Zizian labored as Legault’s chief of employees when Legault was minister of training in 1998.
Zizian is seen because the sort of smart, calming affect Legault wanted in his internal circle. The remainder of the premier’s employees has not modified. Legault’s trusted longtime chief of employees and alter ego, Martin Koskinen, stays in his publish.
Beneficial from Editorial
Rising from their very own pre-session caucus conferences, held during the last two weeks, the three opposition events within the Nationwide Meeting stated they’re able to battle and can painting the CAQ authorities as worn out.
Commercial 9
Article content material
Concluding a gathering in Thetford Mines, interim Liberal chief Marc Tanguay stated his get together, which varieties the official opposition, will focus its winter session on the financial system whereas exhibiting off its federalist convictions. Hovering within the background is the get together’s seek for a everlasting chief and the arrival of former Montreal mayor Denis Coderre within the combine.
Québec solidaire, the second opposition get together, held its caucus in Laval, with co-spokesperson Gabriel Nadeau-Dubois rising to say QS will suggest Quebec launch a blitz to construct extra housing to cope with the present scarcity.
At its caucus assembly in Alma, the Parti Québécois stated it, too, desires to give attention to housing, however from the viewpoint of immigration. It argues the writing was on the wall concerning the disaster as a result of Quebec has misplaced management of the system.
Commercial 10
Article content material
Article content material