Liberal MP Marc Garneau resigns
The federal Liberal MP for Notre-Dame-de-Grâce—Westmount announced to the Quebec caucus of the Liberal Party of Canada (LPC) that he was resigning, reported the National Post, Tuesday.
Canada's first astronaut was elected as an MP five times between 2008 and 2021 under the Liberal banner.
First elected MP in 2008 in the riding Westmount–Ville-Marie. He was then re-elected three times in the riding, which in 2013 became Notre-Dame-de-Grâce–Westmount following the reshuffling of Quebec ridings. In 2015, Mr. Garneau became Minister of Transport and Minister of Foreign Affairs in January 2021.
Mr. Garneau caused quite a stir recently when he expressed his opposition to Liberal Bill C-13, which would amend Canada’s Official Languages Act. The member deplored in particular an amendment to the bill currently under study proposed by the Bloc Québécois, “the purpose of which is to establish that Quebec's Bill 96 should take precedence over federal Bill C-13 in the event of a conflict of 'interpretation”.
“In other words, if there is a conflict of interpretation between C-13 and the Quebec charter of the French language, Bill 96 prevails, a law which, in passing cannot be challenged under the precautionary invocation of the derogation clause,” he said in an open letter posted on Facebook on February 15.
