There was a stabbing early Monday evening in Place Émilie‑Gamelin.
Shots were fired around the same time in the parking lot of an arena in Mercier‑Est, one of the easternmost areas of Mercier‑Hochelaga‑Maisonneuve, but no victims have turned up.
Updates from September, 2022 Toggle Comment Threads | Keyboard Shortcuts
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Kate
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Kate
François Legault doesn’t want to raise immigration, making much of the virtues of little countries like Switzerland and claiming there are advantages to keeping the population down.
The CAQ may be business-oriented, but not primarily. Quebec needs workers, but not, it seems, if they risk diluting (or polluting?) the Quebec population. Radio‑Canada looks into whether increasing immigration would really help the manpower shortage.
The PQ is going further, saying they would squelch immigration back to pre‑2003 levels.
In other election news, Legault says only a few intellectuals are interested in reforming the voting system – something he promised four years ago, then abandoned.
Ian
OK no intellectuals, no foreigners. Got it. Maybe this is a problem we can solve with clowns? Dumb ones de chez nous of course.
Tim S.
From the OECD (and a 1.5 second Google search): “Switzerland is in 3rd place in the OECD in terms of the share of immigrants in its population, with the foreign-born accounting for 26% of the total population. 24% of them arrived in the last 5 years compared with 22% on average across OECD countries.”
SMD
I believe that Switzerland makes it very difficult to get citizenship, however. I think that’s the model Legault would prefer: a subservient temporary foreign workforce that can be sent home at any time. No path to permanent residency or citizenship.
SMD
Related: Status for All march on Sept 18.
mare
Switzerland also has 4 official languages, so much advantage. Maybe Quebec should adopt a second official language so it doesn’t have to provide language classes (there are no teachers) to immigrants, but they can directly do grunt work in Trois-Rivières.
(It is indeed very hard to get Swiss citizenship. My mother was Swiss, but even I can’t get it. All foreign workers are on temporary visas, and those are not easily converted to PR visas like here.)Ephraim
Does they realize how many people travel to Switzerland for work? The foreign population of Switzerland is over 25%. That’s 25% non-citizens in the country and still more who travel into Switzerland daily for work. In 2019 there were 325K people who travelled to work in Switzerland, daily! For a country of 8.6M people. That’s ENORMOUS. That’s likely about 4% of the workforce commuting in, daily.
Switzerland relies so heavily on foreign workers because they won’t give them citizenship. They give them only residency. But the downside of foreign workers are… they send money OUT of the country. In Switzerland, it’s even worse, if you live near the border, you shop outside the country all the time, it’s cheaper. But all these people who commute in to work, leave with their money too. They don’t spend but a few hours in Switzerland working and then spend all that into the economies of France, Germany and Italy.
I mean sure, Parizeau was a complete asshole, but at least he understood economics. You would think that someone that was a businessman would have a better grasp on what this will cost Quebec in the pocketbook
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Kate
The city has created a new position, directeur général adjoint responsable du développement économique et de la stratégie immobilière – an economic development czar – to create closer links between business and the city administration. Once again, Valérie Plante is trying to shake off the obvious stigmata of Projet’s lefty origins.
Ian
Not to worry, it’s quite clear that Projet has become the party of elitist yuppies and landlords.
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Kate
François Legault wants Montrealers to stop “looking down” on Quebec City, and butt out of the 3e lien issue – the struggle over whether Quebec needs a third highway link crossing over to Lévis. He’s very much in favour but is keeping the studies secret till after the election.
steph
Why shouldn’t I be concerned about how my tax dollars are spent?
qatzelok
He’s actively courting the Dummy vote and accuses *anyone who understands the illogic of continued highway construction* of being a snob.
Kate
He might also get some mileage out of suggesting to Quebec City residents that Montrealers look down on them.
Ephraim
Let’s see… $7 billion paid by 6.5 million tax payers… so that’s over $1075 per taxpayer and almost half the population of Quebec lives in the Greater Montreal area (4.1M of 8.5M). It’s more than the cost of buying Quebecor.
Kate
Ephraim, the mayor of Quebec City agrees with you.
Paul
Does anyone know the proportion of Quebec’s 125 seats belong to greater Montreal?? How skewed is the government to rural QC?
Kate
See above, from Allison Hanes in Tuesday’s Gazette: “Montreal has “a quarter of the [Quebec] population living on the island of Montreal and half in the surrounding metropolitan area. […] But it only has about a fifth of the seats in the National Assembly — 27 of 125.”
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Kate
La Presse visited Montréal – Montréal du Gers, that is, in southwestern France, and draws some comparisons. Some nice photos of the French town and its countryside.
There are four other Montréals in France, and several Monreals and other variations around Europe.
Daniel D
Montreal in Germany looks lovely: https://www.katiesaway.com/monreal-germany/
Are you proposing a challenge here – Visit all the Montreals in Europe?
Kate
I wish I had the resources to run a contest and offer that as a prize.
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Kate
Thirty groups representing organized labour held a demonstration Monday against the growing precariousness of working conditions and for an increase in salaries to meet inflation.
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Kate
We’ve had some cool days but the meteorologist interviewed here thinks we’ll still reach some hot temperatures in September. He notes that Quebec experienced a slightly cooler summer than in recent years – and definitely cooler than many places around the world.
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Kate
Radio-Canada’s Pascal Robidas went to Vancouver to check out its SkyTrain system, which is comparable in scope to our REM, once it’s in operation. And he found that there’s a lot of crime on and around the SkyTrain and that Montreal may not be prepared for the amount of policing the REM may need.
Update: Ted Rutland tweets: I wonder how this story, which happened to appear while the brotherhood is in contract negotiations, originated.
Ephraim
Quebec owns 19.9% of SNC Lavalin which owns the Canada Line. Reminds you of something?
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Kate
A man was stabbed in Hochelaga early Monday and there was an immediate arrest.
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