After the French-language debate in Quebec City last week, the federal Conservative party is admitting many of its leadership candidates struggle with speaking French.
Nevertheless, the party said it recognizes its candidates are going to have to improve their language skills if the party is to gain support in Quebec.
Candidates for the party’s top job agreed that the person to replace Stephen Harper should be bilingual.
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“It’s easy to take out some clips of some mistakes with grammar and some candidates who struggle a bit more,” said Andrew Scheer, Conservative leadership candidate, when asked about the French-language debate last week.
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Both Lisa Raitt and Kellie Leitch insist they’ve been taking classes since January of last year and most recently, wealthy businessman and TV celebrity Kevin O’Leary has said he is learning the language.
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“In the beginning, he said I don’t need to speak French: ‘I don’t need to learn French, I’m speaking the language of jobs,'” said Maxime Bernier, Conservative leadership candidate.
“So, now he said, ‘no, I think it’s important to speak French.'”
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The party argues it’s an important asset if the Conservatives plan to beat the Liberals in the next election.
“We have 12 members of parliament coming from the Quebec region and the province of Quebec,” said Bernier.
“For the next election, that will be a big battle ground for us. We want to increase the number of seats in Quebec.”
rachel.lau@globalnews.ca
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