Ontario premier says election of a separatist party in Quebec would be a 'disaster'
CBC
Ontario Premier Doug Ford dipped his toe into Quebec provincial politics Wednesday, suggesting that the election of a separatist party in Quebec would be a 'disaster' for Canada.
Ford was speaking at a joint news conference with New Brunswick Premier Susan Holt before a meeting of provincial premiers.
That will likely be current Quebec Premier François Legault's final first ministers' meeting, as Legault announced earlier this month he would be resigning as premier once his party selects a new leader.
With the Parti Québécois (PQ)'s Paul St-Pierre Plamondon leading handily in opinion polls ahead of the fall provincial election, Ford and Holt were asked what it might be like to sit around the first ministers' table with a separatist premier.
"It'd be a disaster for our country if the separatists got elected. It's as simple as that. We have to be a united Canada right now," Ford said.
"There's never been a more important time in our history to make sure that we stand shoulder to shoulder, united," he continued.
"Not only it'll be good for Canada, it will be good for Quebecers," Ford said.
Holt and other premiers responded along the same lines, albeit somewhat more diplomatically.
"Because of everything that's happening, this current uncertainty, we shouldn't contribute to the economic and social uncertainty. It's a time to strengthen ourselves together," Holt said.
"New Brunswick would like to see Quebec as a good neighbour, a good partner within Canada," she said.
Nova Scotia's premier also weighed in Wednesday.
"I'm on team Canada and I love this country and I believe in this country and I like this country the way it is," Tim Houston said in Ottawa.
"We have to recognize that there are people with grievances and accepting those grievances and trying to work through them is really important," he said.
British Columbia Premier David Eby said for him and British Columbians, "there's really only one path forward for Canadians, and that's through a unified country."
Police on the west coast of Newfoundland say a 27-year-old woman was arrested on Friday night for impaired and dangerous driving, after being caught speeding down the main road in the rural community of Piccadilly at 88 km/h over the speed limit.
Scientists are seeing tropical fish in Nova Scotia with more frequency, and their arrival is prompting concerns about what their presence could mean for local species down the road.
New Brunswick Premier Susan Holt says health care won’t be exempt from her efforts to cut spending — even though her health minister says big spending increases will be unavoidable in coming years.
Pierre Ny St-Amand, the man who drove a bus into a Laval daycare in 2023, killing two young children and injuring six others, has been declared a high-risk accused.
A former CTV and CBC reporter hired to serve as Manitoba’s trade envoy to the United States is taking home more than $480,000 Cdn a year in consulting fees, according to his contract with the province.
The teen who lit her classmate on fire at a Saskatoon high school returns to court on Monday to learn the judge's decision on her sentence.
On a July morning in 2024, Dwayne Cardinal was packing up his tent outside the Bissell Centre when a police cruiser pulled up and two officers got out.
The City of Revelstoke and the Columbia-Shuswap Regional District have passed motions formalizing their intention to push the provincial government to protect an old-growth forest.
The province will once again decide who will hold Niagara’s top municipal post after the sudden resignation last week of Bob Gale, but exactly when the next regional chair will be announced isn’t clear just yet.
A wind warning is in place for Windsor-Essex, Chatham-Kent and Sarnia-Lambton on Monday with gusts as high as 90 km/h possible, according to Environment Canada.
Just a year after the Alberta government made a big splash unveiling its new border security team to the public with an announced $29-million investment, its latest budget shows the province only spent a third of the total it earmarked for the work over its first year.
Following several fatal collisions in northern Ontario this winter, a Sudbury, Ont., resident has created a website to track incidents across the region.
A Cambridge endometriosis advocate’s petition calling for change in how the disease is treated and recognized in Canada has received sponsorship by a member of Parliament.