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Parti Quebecois takes aim at language laws, overweight people

If you're an Anglophone in Quebec and the Parti Québécois wins the Sept. 4 election, your life is destined to become a little more difficult.

PQ leader Pauline Marois has announced that, if elected, her party would adopt a tougher language law within a hundred days of taking office.

According to the Globe and Mail, the PQ leader expressed concerns that the English language was becoming increasingly present as the preferred language of communication in Montreal. Marois claims that data collected by the Office québécois de langue française, the government agency that oversees the enforcement of the language law, showed that between 2010 and 2012 the number of merchants in Montreal who welcomed their customers in French has dropped from 89 per cent to 74 per cent.

"The message has to be clear: in Quebec we live in French, we work in French, we communicate in French," Marois said during a campaign stop in Montreal on Sunday.

Among the proposed legislation's provisions, the new law would force companies with more than 10 employees to conduct business entirely in French. The Globe notes that this would affect 54,000 businesses, mostly retailers who would be closely monitored to ensure they speak French to their clients.

The new law would also affect students: access to English language elementary and secondary schools would be further limited while Francophones would be prevented from attending English-language junior colleges known as CEGEPS.

"Our objective is to increase the knowledge and use of French across all our institutions, our businesses and in our schools," Marois said.

Meanwhile, it appears Marois is also taking aim at overweight people — at least according to a Coalition Avenir Québec candidate.

According to CBC News, a journalist asked Marois in French: "In your announcement today, you speak of the importance of a healthy lifestyle, of the state's duty to promote that healthy lifestyle. You spoke of healthy body weight and being active. Do you think the health minister ... needs to set an example in those areas?"

She replied: "I believe a health minister has a basic duty to set an example. Like, for me, the education minister has a duty to set an example by sending their children to public school."

The CAQ's health care critic, the 'portly' Gaétan Barrette, believes Marois was taking a shot at him.

"She made those comments with her candidate [who is a doctor, Réjean Hébert] in my riding. I won't go and say that Quebecers are not capable of reading between the lines. That would be to insult the people. I'm not vexed by these kinds of things.

"There is no impact for me but there is one for her," Barrette told the Montreal Gazette.

"She has suffered in politics because she is a woman, because her hair was not the right colour or length, because she had clothes that were too expensive, because she had jewelry and scarves. And today she uses this.

"It's like we're at the level of schoolyard insults."

Language rights and overweight people — just another day in the wacky world of Quebec politics.