{"id":203006,"date":"2025-10-10T15:55:22","date_gmt":"2025-10-10T15:55:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/203006\/"},"modified":"2025-10-10T15:55:22","modified_gmt":"2025-10-10T15:55:22","slug":"proposed-quebec-constitution-will-protect-provinces-identity-and-autonomy-legault-says","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/203006\/","title":{"rendered":"Proposed Quebec constitution will protect province\u2019s identity and autonomy, Legault says"},"content":{"rendered":"

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The Quebec\u00a0government has tabled a draft constitution that Premier Fran\u00e7ois Legault says will protect Quebecers\u2019 distinct identity and culture.<\/p>\n

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The constitution bill, tabled Thursday in the provincial legislature, would take precedence over all other provincial laws and is intended to defend\u00a0Quebec\u00a0values and reinforce the province\u2019s autonomy.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen we look at our history, our survival as a nation was improbable, but we are still here,\u201d Legault said Thursday in the national assembly. \u201cWe now have the responsibility to ensure that the history of our beautiful nation continues.\u201d<\/p>\n

Legault said the bill would be the \u201claw of laws\u201d in\u00a0Quebec, and characterized it as the culmination of all the measures his government has taken to strengthen\u00a0Quebec\u00a0values, including its secularism law and its overhaul of the French-language law.<\/p>\n

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It comes as his Coalition Avenir\u00a0Qu\u00e9bec\u00a0party is lagging in the polls ahead of a provincial election scheduled for October 2026. Opposition parties have spoken out against the draft constitution, saying the government failed to consult with them.<\/p>\n

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The bill, which is the first new piece of legislation tabled since Legault prorogued the legislature last month, defines a set of collective principles, including the equality of men and women and the status of French as the only common language of\u00a0Quebec.<\/p>\n

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It would enshrine the right to abortion as well as access to medical assistance in dying.<\/p>\n

It would also forbid organizations that get public funding, such as school boards, from using portions of provincial government grants to pay for court challenges of laws deemed to protect \u201cthe fundamental characteristics of\u00a0Quebec.\u201d The provision is a direct response to legal challenges of Quebec\u2019s secularism law, Bill 21, and its French-language reform, Bill 96.<\/p>\n

The constitution bill would also have the\u00a0Quebec\u00a0premier recommend who should be appointed lieutenant-governor. Lieutenant-governors are currently appointed by the governor general on the recommendation of the prime minister. The new legislation would also rename the lieutenant-governor the \u201cofficer of\u00a0Quebec.\u201d<\/p>\n

The\u00a0Quebec\u00a0premier would also make recommendations for\u00a0Quebec\u00a0senators and Supreme Court judges to the prime minister, according to the new bill.<\/p>\n

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\n\t\t&copy 2025 The Canadian Press\t<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Descrease article font size Increase article font size The Quebec\u00a0government has tabled a draft constitution that Premier Fran\u00e7ois…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":203007,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[22],"tags":[49,48,295,63778,714,99750,66],"class_list":{"0":"post-203006","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-environment","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-environment","11":"tag-francois-legault","12":"tag-politics","13":"tag-quebec-constitution","14":"tag-science"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/203006","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=203006"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/203006\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/203007"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=203006"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=203006"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=203006"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}