An Official Opposition That Defends Quebecers’ Interests

The Leader of the Official Opposition and Critic responsible for the Charter for Regions, Ms. Dominique Anglade, accompanied by the Deputy Parliamentary House Leader, Mr. Monsef Derraji, offered a summary of the past few months as the autumn 2020 parliamentary session drew to a close.

The current pandemic is hard on everyone. We honoured the mandate and trust that Quebecers placed in us by making realistic and audacious proposals. Thus, all Quebecers have benefitted from the progress that we made.

Constructive Proposals

Here are some of the proposals we submitted to François Legault’s government:

• Rapidly adopt a universal public psychotherapy coverage program;
• Implement ratio projects to reduce the number of patients under each health care professional’s charge;
• Offer direct assistance to our SMEs;
• Implement mobile testing clinics for our schools;
• Offer free masks in our schools;
• Ensure adequate ventilation in our schools;
• Offer a property tax break for all hoteliers in 2020;
• Defend the creation of a code of conduct to govern contractual relations between Quebec businesses, our family farms and major commercial chains like Walmart;
• Prohibit fighting in sporting activities in which persons under the age of 18 participate;

The months we have just lived through were of a peculiar nature. As the Official Opposition, we reached out to the government to work with them and combine our ideas to halt pandemic. We submitted the government with a multitude of proposals throughout the entire session. Proposals that were focused on the realities in our regions, our cities and our municipalities. Close to thirty proposals emanating from local needs were presented by our team of MNAs. We never got discouraged and we made significant progress for Quebecers during our exchanges in parliamentary committees. Indeed, it was our political party that requested to hear from the National Public Health Director, Dr. Horacio Arruda, and we were the ones who asked for a genuine public inquiry into the management of the pandemic.

–Dominique Anglade, Leader of the Official Opposition and Critic responsible for the Charter for Regions

As Parliamentary Leader of the Official Opposition, I am satisfied and proud of the work that we accomplished during this past session. Regretfully, parliamentary proceedings were tainted by the Covid-19 pandemic. Our role as the Official Opposition is to question the government on its management of the crisis and we did so in a spirit of collaboration so that we could respond to Quebecers’ questions and concerns. We also made constructive legislative proposals including a first bill to prohibit conversion therapies, urging the government to take action. We also proposed a bill to prohibit fighting among minors in sports to protect them and avoid the health problems that can ensue. Through amendments and discussions in parliamentary committee, the Liberal Party made significant advances, including by bolstering the Autorité des Marchés Publics’ powers, in order to prevent all types of corruption in the government’s bill 66, An Act respecting the acceleration of certain infrastructure projects. We were efficient, rigorous, we were good, constructive listeners and we did it all in the higher interests of all Quebecers.

–André Fortin, Official Opposition House Leader and Critic for Public Finance