We’re to expect snow overnight Tuesday to Wednesday.
Updates from November, 2023 Toggle Comment Threads | Keyboard Shortcuts
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Kate
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Kate
Elections Quebec is redrawing some riding boundaries and wants to abolish east‑end Anjou–Louis-Riel, but the city wants to preserve it. This isn’t partisan – the population moves around, so the electoral map gets redrawn periodically – but it will remove one MNA from the city. The riding is currently represented by Karine Boivin Roy, one of the CAQ’s two MNAs on the island.
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Kate
The Alouettes’ Marc-Antoine Dequoy got angry about the lack of French during the CFL final on Sunday, and now TVA is mad that the league hasn’t celebrated in French on X.
JaneyB
And yet, according to the CTV piece, the CFL says for Grey Cup Sunday, “there was signage at the festival events, on the field and around the stadium. There was also digital signage online, bilingual ceremonies, anthem and PA Announcer.” OK. I guess Dequoy likes to be angry.
Joey
His promo (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glossary_of_professional_wrestling_terms#promo) was a lot more compelling when it was about the English Canadian sports media ‘disrespecting’ the Als out than when it was about bilingual signage at the game in Hamilton.
Kate
JaneyB, taking a lot of steroids will do that to a guy.
Josh
JaneyB: There was nothing in the stadium as of a few days before the game. It was hastily slapped on at the last minute. Here is a tweet from a reporter about 48hrs ahead of the game: https://twitter.com/ArashMadani/status/1725570183673069631
Kate: Or the peak of his professional career. Maybe the adrenaline was pumping after winning a trophy he likely dreamed about when he was a kid. Maybe it had something to do with that. Or maybe it’s your thing. Who could ever tell, eh. Might as well just concoct something possibly-defamatory.
Tim S.
At least it wasn’t a Disneyland ad.
Daniel
I am no great defender of the French language but I think both Dequoy and TVA have pretty valid points here. And dismissing his frustrations as “too many steroids” is pretty gross.
walkerp
Totally valid complaints by Dequoy. In your face, Hamilton and the CFL!
Kate, you’ve done a great job of being mostly neutral but it has become clear over the years that you have an anti-jock bias! 🙂
Kate
walkerp, I do try to cover the main points of professional sports in Montreal but I’d be a hypocrite if I were to pretend I actually cared about how the teams are doing.
I do have a bias against seeing public money spent on professional sports, because it’s so often a means for wealthy owners to get the public purse to pay for their expensive toys.
There’s a professional sport I do like to watch, but it isn’t practised here and never will be. So I’m not entirely anti‑jock.
dwgs
I thought DeQuoy made a valid point. He clarified his remarks the next day after the adrenaline wore off and sounds like a reasonable person. Kate, if you’re going to hate on moneybag professional athletes you’ll have to give CFL players a pass, most of them make less than 100k for a job that requires a crazy amount of time and dedication.
Kate
Didn’t say I hated the athletes – I know that their careers are necessarily short and peak early, and can be cut even shorter by injury, so it’s a chancy business. It’s the owners I distrust.
MarcG
Kate: Is your sport shirling? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6gu3mbl8SAk
carswell
Sumo wrestling? Jai alai? Ostrich racing? Dwarf-tossing (dog forbid)?
(Please ignore us if we’re prying. It’s just that your statement comes across as an invitation to inquire.)
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Kate
Le Devoir discovers that thousands of immigrants have been allowed to study in English high schools, “en contradiction avec l’esprit de la Charte de la langue française,” by studying as an adult in a professional program.
This will have to be stopped.
Ian
I was wonderng about that as I know there are lots of immigrants in adult ed getting their HS diplomas.
Given that this government thas already demonstrated that it is paternalistic enough to tell adults what language they can study in, anyhow, as evidenced by bill 96.steph
”néo-Québécois”, is this going to be the new way of being racist without being racist?
Ian
Definitely a dogwhistle.
Daisy
I don’t know about “néo-Québécois” but “New Canadians” seems to be used in a non-racist way, as far as I can tell.
Ian
Perhaps the kind of people that say “New Canadians” and the kind of people that say “néo-Québecois” have somewhat different politcal agendas? New Canadians arwe to be welcomed, n-q to be identified and isolated – but ftotally assimilated of course. The main difference is that in Québec multiculturalismn is literally perceived as a threat.
Uatu
The article also said that another problem was that kids of temporary foreign workers also got English schooling. Does that include kids of hockey players that might play in a future Qc City team? Looks like it’ll be hard to attract players if that’s the case. Oh well.
Kevin
@Uatu
I was half-expecting Eric Girard to say today that one of the many steps in getting an NHL team in Quebec City will be allowing the children of players to go to school in English.jeather
Presumably hockey players send their children to unsubsidized schools for elementary, thus earning enough points to get eligibility. And I think a lot of the private high schools are giving up the subsidies now, too.
Kevin
The article refers to 140,000 people undergoing professional training at high school over 20 years.
They’re not getting a DES (high school degree), they’re getting DEPs, which is equivalent to a DEC (cegep 3-year degree) *just in a different building*.The writer has made a tremendous error by conflating high school students with those attending vocational schools.
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Kate
So many complaints and jokes have been made about orange cones in recent years that La Presse looked into the benefits of all that construction work, and found that water main breaks are way down and road quality is up. Orange cones weren’t just a woke city hall pulling a prank on drivers, imagine.
Sprocket
I seem to recall the city rents, not owns the orange cones. It would be interesting to see some data on this.
Ian
I know a lot of them are rented from Garda. Many of them are rented by the specific construction outfit per job site though and rebilled.
Bert
Signatek is another one. I am sure that contractors, like Roxboro also has their own stash. Everything that is used is certainly charged to the project. This will include everything, like cement barriers, scolding, etc.
As an aside… At the grocery store, etc. those blue CHEP palettes…. Rented. Someone is paying a buck or two a month for them!
Ephraim
@Bert – Depends on the colour – blue are CHEP (Commonwealth Handling Equipment Pool), red is LPR (La Palette Rouge). They are almost all “rented” or borrowed in some way. If you get caught with a blue or red and you aren’t licenced, the companies will definitely go after you. But if you deal with freight, you likely will need to call up the cartage company at some point and request that they deliver you some pallets.
Meezly
Not directly related, but infrastructurally-related… there have been semi-regular power outages in the Mile End area the past several months (since the April ice storm). There have been infrequent outages in the past but lately, it’s been happening every 2-4 weeks (sometimes once a week). The outages last from 1-4 hours.
This is usually due to a fire or gas leak and I guess the fire dept. gets HydroQ to shut down the power in our grid. But why can’t the fire dept cut the main breaker and if they can’t access, why can’t HQ shut down that meter number, or isolate the lines in that block? Why does the whole grid has to suffer a power outage that impacts 3500-4000 residences and businesses?
I have a neighbour who lives just outside the affected grid, and they never experience outages like ours. They too live in a high density mixed area, which can have a higher occurence of fire, etc., but why is this particular quadrant in the Mile End so problematic?
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Kate
The big news this week is the strikes.
The Common Front will walk out for three days, Tuesday till Thursday, November 21, 22 and 23.
The FIQ nurses’ union is striking November 23 and 24.
The Journal lays out which schools will be affected by the unlimited FAE (Fédération autonome de l’enseignement) strike which begins November 23.
CEGEPs will be striking on the 23rd and 24th.
Adding: I’ve been surprised to learn that the FAE offers no strike pay.
jeather
Which French schools, since they seem to be ignoring the English schools which are closed this week.
Daisy
Note that many (most?) cegeps are covered by the Common Front strike (Nov 21-23). Most cegep professionals are in the FPPC, which is in the CSQ and therefore Common Front; a minority are in the group that is part of the strike mentioned the Journal de Montréal article.
Nicholas
You wouldn’t know English schools are closed by looking at the EMSB or LBPSB websites, nor CBC Montreal’s stories. (All three on-island French service centres all have notes on their websites.) Gazette says English schools off 21-23. I assume students are well aware, but it’s not just students and parents who deal with schools, so maybe the comms people (who, at the EMSB for example, haven’t put out a press release about the strike or negotiations at all, nor releases on anything in 12 days) could earn their salaries.
jeather
Yeah, I’m aware of the EMSB because I have friends with kids in EMSB schools. They made announcements really late to parents, too, I’m not sure why they are so cagey about this. However, the fact that the English boards are not being forthcoming doesn’t mean a journalist cannot do their job.
Ian
The EMSB sent out an announcement on the 15th.
I’m guessing le Devoir didn’t bother mentioning English schools becasue they assume their readers all have their kids in French schools.jeather
Le Journal, and on the one hand, point taken; on the other hand, I’m consistently surprised how many francophones (acquired rights through their grandparents and/or married an anglo) send their kids to EMSB elementary schools.
I think the 15th is pretty late, though everyone pretty much planned on it earlier.
Ian
I sent my kid to a CSDM primary school but as soon as bill 96 passed I put her in an English high school. Given that the Ministry is now refusing to issue certificates for historical anglos attending English CEGEP if they didn’t get them beore graduating high school, I know I made the right choice in not trusting them. If my kid wants to go to a French CEGEP, great, but if there’s a program that’s only offered at an English one, also great.
Ian
@Daisy my CEGEP Faculty union belongs to FNEEQ-CSN. Here’s a list of member unions if you are interested:
Meezly
I thought that part of having union dues is that part of it goes towards emergency funds like strike pay?
Another reason to hopefully reach a resolution within 3 days.
Kate
I thought so too, Meezly. I can only assume that a majority of FAE members voted at some point not to do that, which they may be regretting now.
Daisy
Ian, I was talking about professionals, not faculty.
dhomas
The MTA, the union for most EMSB teachers, also does not provide strike pay. This was surprising to me as my mother worked for a (different) union and this was one of the protections they offered: if they need to strike, there are some reserves to pay the employees.
My wife works for an EMSB school and about half her fifth grade class is “Québecois” who speak primarily French at home, with acquired rights via a parent or even a grandparent. The proportion of francophones in her class has increased in the past few years. The CAQ is not only punishing the Anglo community, but also the Francophones who ALREADY SPEAK FRENCH and would like to learn English as well. I guess if they only speak French, they can’t leave and must contribute to Quebec’s finances and culture?
Ian
ding ding ding
It’s like in the old days when the priests would council their flock not to learn English for fear they might get exposed to “outsider” ideas and become protestant.Tim S.
An early unlimited strike with no strike pay, that’s a real kamikaze move.
jeather
Do the school boards have the same (or very similar) pay scales? At least within the same area, I assume urban vs rural differs.
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