(Dix heures trente-cinq minutes)
M. Kelley
: Alors,
bonjour, tout le monde. Je veux juste rapidement dire que j'ai trouvé aujourd'hui…
Il n'y a pas beaucoup des occasions pour moi de poser des questions directement
au premier ministre concernant la communauté d'expression anglaise. Alors,
chaque année, on a cet exercice, qui est très important, que je peux parler
directement avec le premier ministre, puis j'ai trouvé qu'il a donné des
moitiés de réponses, là, dans le sens qu'il n'a pas répondu toujours directement
à des questions, par exemple, une couple de questions sur les commissions
scolaires, s'il va accepter des plans quand même, avec mon propre projet de loi,
alors, je trouve qu'il donne un petit peu d'information, quand même, avec des
communications, c'était comme : Peut-être qu'on va faire plus, mais on
verra. Alors, je pense que la communauté espérait de trouver des réponses un
petit peu plus claires.
I'll just do that in
English, quickly. While it's great to do this exchange every year with the
Premier, I don't get tons of opportunities to speak with him directly on these
matters, so having this brief 20-minute window gave me
a chance to ask him some of the questions that I think are extremely important
and pertinent to the English-speaking community. I wasn't, you know, satisfied
of all answers. I felt like I kind of got some half responses on my questions.
For example, are we going to push back schoolboards elections and pair them
with municipal elections. I think that's a solution that can make our
schoolboards elections work and have a higher level of participation. On
communication concerning health and social safety during the pandemic, he
didn't clearly say if there is directives in place to continue to do that and
do more, if there will be. It's sort of «on verra», and we will see.
But again, it was good
just to have the information, ask about him the follow-up to the Black Lives
Matter movement, if he's going to meet the community, things like that. So,
it's a good opportunity for me, but I still think there's a lot of questions
that remains to be answered. But that leaves myself to continue to press him as
a critic for relations with English-speaking Quebeckers. But again, I'd just
like to highlight that it is an important exercise. I am happy that we're able
to do this. After a Liberal Government did decide to create a secretariat, there is now more
accountability that has to be taken by the Government
of Québec to respond to some of the needs of the community.
Alors, maintenant,
je pense qu'on va commencer avec des questions.
Le Modérateur
: Oui,
des questions?
M. Bélair-Cirino (Marco) : Oui,
à votre collègue, député de Gouin, le premier ministre a réitéré qu'un
journaliste de la Gazette avait un rôle à jouer dans le fait que la communauté
anglophone était davantage inquiète de contracter la COVID-19. Il a ajouté que
les anglophones au Québec regardaient davantage des réseaux comme CNN qui
avaient une couverture sur la gestion de la crise par Donald Trump, et étaient
de ce fait plus inquiets quant à la situation du coronavirus. Est-ce que vous
partagez un peu son analyse de la chose ou vous l'écartez complètement?
M. Kelley
: Bien, je
vais commencer avec le fait que 80 % de la communauté anglophone ou la
communauté d'expression anglaise réside dans le Grand Montréal. Alors, juste
avec ça, on a été plus impactés. Des personnes probablement connaissent plus de
personnes qui ont été malades. Est-ce que c'est possible, le fait que les
anglophones regardent plus CNN et peut-être regardent le New York Times?
Peut-être, mais je pense qu'il y a des francophones qui écoutent ça aussi.
Puis, je pense, les journalistes
francophones couvrent pas mal qu'est-ce qui se passe aux États-Unis. Alors, ce
n'est pas comme c'est juste une histoire qui passe dans les médias anglophones.
Parce que ce n'est pas vrai. Quand je regarde Le Devoir, quand je
regarde LCN, quand je regarde Radio-Canada, je vois souvent Donald Trump puis
des nouvelles qui sortent des États-Unis. Alors, je pense, peut-être, c'est
plus la question que la population est plus basée à Montréal. Et je pense que
ça prend plus d'études, peut-être, de mieux comprendre ça. Est-ce que c'est une
différence culturelle? Difficile pour moi de répondre à ce stade-ci, on a juste
un sondage. Mais, moi, je pense que ce n'est pas nécessairement en consultant
les médias, mais plus le fait que beaucoup des anglophones sont à Montréal ou
dans la grande région de Montréal.
M. Bélair-Cirino (Marco) :
Vous avez noté que les documents qui étaient transmis par la poste au début de
la pandémie étaient d'abord en français. Est-ce que ça a contribué, selon vous,
au fait que peut-être certaines personnes d'expression anglaise qui n'avaient
pas toute l'information et qui étaient peut-être davantage inquiètes, des personnes
qui ne se branchent pas à Internet, qui font partie des communautés les plus
vulnérables, qu'elles n'avaient pas ces informations-là transmises par le ministère
de la Santé dans leur langue?
M. Kelley
: Bien, pour
moi, je pense que la question de ça, c'était juste... Quand même, avant que le
virus est arrivé ici, c'était évident, quand même, avec les chiffres de Chine,
que c'était un virus qui impacte plus des personnes qui... les 65 ans et plus.
Alors, je pense que c'était juste ce «gap» là. Je ne sais pas si ça a contribué
du fait que plus d'aînés étaient malades, je ne peux aller là, je n'ai pas de
chiffres, mais c'est sûr que ça a créé une crainte que... Est-ce que le
gouvernement est sensibilisé à la réalité que moi, je n'ai pas l'accès à ça,
moi, je suis aîné puis je veux avoir un document chez moi, avec l'information
qui était primordiale et pertinente sur la situation au Québec? C'est possible
qu'il a créé des craintes avec certains membres de la population, mais je pense
qu'à la base c'était juste une question de sécurité et santé publique, les gens
étaient comme… Écoute, je veux juste bien comprendre, peut-être je vais prendre
les grandes lignes et comprendre ça. Mais c'était un document qui était
complet, avec beaucoup d'informations, alors je pense que ça, c'est où... L'inquiétude
de la communauté, c'était plus la question de sécurité et la santé.
M. Bélair-Cirino (Marco) :
Une dernière question, en ce qui me concerne. Je me demandais si, à la lumière
de ce que le premier ministre a dit... Il a dit qu'il a respecté toutes les
lois, les règles, il en a fait même davantage, notamment en s'exprimant en
anglais durant ses points de presse. Est-ce que vous partagez... Dans le fond,
est-ce que, selon vous, là... plus que respecté les lois et les règles? Et
est-ce que, selon vous, il devrait en faire davantage, advenant une deuxième
vague, pour rejoindre la communauté anglophone?
M. Kelley
: C'est sûr
que, dans les points de presse quotidiens, c'était un important changement,
parce que c'était... tout le monde regarde des clips, des capsules, puis on a
un message clair en anglais, alors ça, c'était un très important changement. Et,
quand même, les autres ministres, et, quand même, Dr Arruda a pris... suivi le
premier ministre et a commencé à faire la même chose, je pense que c'est très
important. Mais, quand même, après que le document qui était fait pour toute
information générale, un autre a été envoyé pour la protection de la jeunesse,
qui était en français. C'était après ça. Alors, des gens... Et ça, c'est aussi
un enjeu qui touche des anglophones et des personnes qui parlent juste anglais.
Alors, je pense qu'on peut toujours faire
plus, particulièrement dans une situation… dans une pandémie. Je ne dis pas que
le gouvernement doit changer tout, partout, dans tous les différents
ministères, mais, dans ce contexte-ci, c'est vraiment... comme je dis, c'est
une pandémie globale, mondiale, et je pense que le
gouvernement peut continuer de faire ces gestes comme ça puis s'assurer qu'il y
ait des directives claires, juste rassurer les communautés puis assurer qu'ils
ont toute l'information nécessaire chez eux.
M. Bélair-Cirino
(Marco) : Juste pour être clair, vous ne
demandez pas de revoir la loi, vous comptez sur la bonne foi du gouvernement?
M. Kelley
: Présentement, parce que je pense qu'il y a des clauses dans la loi
qui existent qui permettent au gouvernement d'agir si c'est nécessaire, oui.
M. Authier (Philip)
: Were you satisfied… because he said, when it comes to communicate
in English, if there's another wave, that will be a case by case basis. Are you
satisfied with that answer that…
M. Kelley
: Again, it's kind of hard because I don't know what those case by
case basis that you are sort of referring to… I think everything that comes
with communication that pertains to this pandemic should be communicated in
both languages, especially documentation, information that is going out, that
is from the Government, that can be posted anywhere. I think that those are
things that exist that we can flexible on and make sure it happens in this
particular time.
So, I wasn't too sure
what he was meaning by case by case. How is he going to judge which situation
is more pertinent than the other? What documentation is more important than the
other? It's hard for me, but I hope that there's just very concrete efforts
made to make sure that there is constant communication in the English language
for the community and to make sure everyone clearly understands what the
Government is expecting and wanting of them to follow.
Mme Senay (Cathy) : If the Government was passing decrees, for taking decisions because
it was like an exceptional period, exceptional times, we heard that million of
times during the pandemic in the spring… was not an important argument for the
Premier and the documentation to be translated as soon as possible in English
because it was a crisis. And the major case was Herron that broke up every
single thing. So, do you understand the logic, is there one?
M. Kelley
: I would like to say that, at least, I'm trying to more… follow… Of
course, it's a pandemic situation, I get it at the get-go, people are confused
and scattered, but I want to just kind of follow the logic of was it possible. Can
we do it? At least, you know, the federal Government can produce documents in
both languages very quickly and send it out to everyone, and it's not like a
huge issue. I know here, in Québec, we have the capacity to translate documents
very well. So, I don't think it's a huge question of the translation, per se,
of the documents. The logic I'm seeing here, they have a lot of flexibility to
do what they want in emergency situations, and I hope that information, again,
pertaining to the virus, it continues to be sent out in English and
communicated in English, honestly, as much as humanly possible during this
time.
Mme Senay (Cathy) : But I look at the press conferences. The Premier started to speak
in English on March 20th. This is after the major press conferences when we had
the major news. It was a week after everything.
M. Kelley
: Yes, and, look, that was a time to, and, you know, our Leader
Pierre Arcand heard it back from us, MNAs. And they were having their weekly
meetings with the Premier, and we said : Look, this is one thing that has
got to change in those daily press conferences. Have the clip in English, don't
leave it to the journalists that have to do sort of a translation and have no
clip. Get the information out there.
We know the pandemic
communication is key. People have to understand what the Government is expecting of you and what is
needed to be done to curve the spread of the virus. So, on that front, he
definitely... I would have wished he would have done it at the get-go. I'm sure
he probably wished he would have done it at the get-go, but in the end, he
corrected the situation. I think that is important and it has to continue,
especially when we are talking about this pandemic situation.
Mme Senay (Cathy) : So, it's still... I mean...
M. Kelley
: He was late to delivering it, and I wish he would have the initial
reflex to do it along with his Health Minister, even Dr. Arruda. But, like
I said, it was done afterwards, and I can give him credit on that. But again,
in this situation, it's important to communicate in both languages when
concerning the pandemic.
Mme Senay (Cathy) : Because, as you said, for seniors…
M. Kelley
: Well, especially, if you look at seniors, again they might not just
go to... Just even think about the people who are living in a CHSLD or a
private residence that don't have a... We saw how many people who can contact
their family. They don't use FaceTime, all that. Those are pretty concrete
examples where it is probably better. They would like to have a document in
their hands. And there is a lot of seniors isolated at home who probably prefer
to have that, not as complicated as going online and not...
As information kept
coming out from the Government,
the websites got more and more complicated with all the information that was
there too. And that is just the reality because more things got added in. So,
sometimes, having those big things directly send to especially our seniors or
people who might not necessarily have access to Internet, it is extremely
important.
M. Authier (Philip)
: But are you satisfied that this will be repeated in the next... if
there is another wave?
M. Kelley
: Wait and see. I will have to wait and see because it might be the
intention. The Premier might have all the intention in the world to do it, but
will the machine do it? Will the civil servants act in the same way? That, I'm
not too sure. Because, again, when this came out with just the document at the first time, we got a
response from the Health Ministry saying : Under our politics and under
our laws, we don't have to do that.
So, even if the Premier
wants to do it, will the civil servants, at some point — I'm not trying to blame them — do something different based on guidelines they have? So, I hope
that there is... Just like I said, that's why I asked the Premier : Were
clear directives given to the civil servants to make sure that this doesn't
repeat itself? And I can only hope that they've learned their lesson and it
doesn't repeat.
Mme Fletcher (Raquel) : You put forward other hypotheses for why Québec's Anglophones might be more worried about coronavirus than
Francophones. Can you elaborate on that and explain why you don't believe that
it's just CNN?
M. Kelley
: I do think that there has to be at least... and again it will be
very interesting to see when more studies are done on the subject as why it was
this case and it was also some cultural communities that saw things differently
than Francophones. And I think part of this has to do… is that the virus hit Montréal harder. It hit the large... you
know, the «grande région de Montréal», the large... the Greater Montréal region harder. So, Anglophones might have known somebody who was
sick. Anglophones might have just been more aware that their neighbors were. You
know, you go down that list, I think there might just have been that reality on
the ground, that it was... People were saying : Gosh! this is happening in
Montréal, I can see the tension
in the city, I can see how worried people are. So, I think that might be part
of it. If you look... Especially when you're doing a poll of a community that
already is, you know, roughly 10% of the population and
spread out also in other regions, that could explain it.
But again, because I
don't want to just say it's because we read more New York Times articles
and we see CNN more frequently, because francophones also consume English media
too and they also see on their own news networks what's going on in the States,
what's going on in the world, that could frighten them as well. So...
And, in the end, when you
look at those statistics, people are pretty worried overall, and we have to
remember that too. There might have been a difference between the two
communities, but it's not has if Francophones were saying : We're not
worried about this at all. It was just... There was a little bit of a
discrepancy between the two.
Mme Fletcher (Raquel) : The Premier again dug in his heels and almost blamed Mr. Derfel
for Anglophones being worried about coronavirus. Can you imagine the Premier
doing that and pointing out singularly a Francophone journalist?
M. Kelley
:
If he can do it to an Anglophone journalist, I'm sure he could do it to a Francophone
journalist. Maybe, in his view, it was just easier to spar with Aaron Derfel,
I don't really know. I think there's other ways the Premier... He could
probably respond to Mr. Derfel, his team could respond to Mr. Derfel,
but I don't think it was necessary to attack a journalist publicly like that.
And again, in the context where we do see a lot of Donald Trump in the news and
how he treats journalists, Québec is nowhere near that, and let's just never go
down that path.
Mme Fletcher (Raquel) : So, you're calling him out for that.
M. Kelley
:
I called him out at the time, I called his colleagues out at the time. He
deleted his tweet. And again, I'm not going to get into what Aaron Derfel
says versus, you know... I just don't think that it's, you know, necessary to
have those debates and public arguments and call out a journalist, block a
journalist. I don't think it's very helpful, and it's always important to
respect journalists. They are free and independent. They are a check on
Government. And it's a fundamental part of our democracy, and I do think you
can always be in disagreement, but don't go out there, and spar, and fight
publicly about it and call out a single journalist.
Mme Senay (Cathy) : And the effects of the school content. You talked about Télé-Québec
in French, you talked about the website for the Education Ministry, I don't
remember the title, but everything was in French.
M. Kelley
:
Yes, and it's... I just want to make sure... And, you know, I can accept the
Premier saying : Well, there is a lot of, you know, rush in the first
going back to school. There are or might be a lot of English-speaking parents,
we don't know… There's a court challenge before the courts right now to see if
English children can stay at home and parents have that right. So, if we do, like we saw in Ontario, a large significant portion of parents say :
I want to keep my kids at home. The Minister of Education promised them the same education as anyone who would
be in a classroom. So, if those tools exist in French they have to exist in
English, because, you know, English-speaking Quebeckers deserve the exact same education as French-speaking Quebeckers do. So, I just want to make sure
that it's on the radar of the premier. There are avenues to do that, to make
capsules that run on T.V. I know Matv, for example, and Vidéotron have segments
that are in English. I mean, there are ways we can go about it, if Télé-Québec can't do it, that we can find outlets
that will for sure provide content for children at home and to help parents
out.
And there's also always
the possibility that a second wave hits us, and everyone has to go back home. I
mean, that's just always in the things that we have to take into consideration.
So, I just hope the ministry thinks about preparing those things in English to
make sure English students are being treated the same as French students.
Le Modérateur
: Merci.
M. Kelley
: C'est tout? Merci.
(Fin à 10 h 52)