A controversial immigration bill has stalled in the National Assembly and the Coalition Avenir Quebec is accusing Liberal MNAs of obstruction.

Since it was first introduced in February Bill 9 has been a cause of friction in Quebec City, with immigrants’ rights advocates and opposition political parties calling the bill unfair. The bill would overhaul Quebec’s immigration system, throwing out a backlog of thousands of applications to start fresh.

On Tuesday Immigration Minister Simon Jolin-Barrette accused the Liberals of holding the bill up.

“The Liberals don’t have a good attitude in the way that we conduct our debate here at the National Assembly,” he said.

Liberal MNA Dominique Anglade returned fire, saying the CAQ hadn’t done its due diligence before presenting the bill.

“I think the homework that had to be done before presenting the bill hasn’t been done at all and it’s quite apparent,” she said.

On Tuesday morning, the Liberals made three demands: that the government process the roughly 18,000 pending applications, get rid of clauses making permanent residence conditional on passing a Quebec values test and reduce the administrative burden on companies.

“We’ve been constructive, we’ve brought amendments,” said Anglade. “We believe that there are elements that are positive in the bill. It’s just that there are elements that are very detrimental and we would like to get rid of them.”

Quebec Solidaire co-spokesperson Gabriel Nadeau-Dubois, whose party has sided with the Liberals, said Jolin-Barrette is frustrated and trying to rush the bill through the National Assembly.

“He’s not really looking for a compromise. He’s looking to go as fast as he can,” he said. “He’s looking to adopt this bill as fast as possible and, as an opposition party, we’re only doing our job trying to make that bill a better bill.”

Of the bill’s 21 articles, only six have been adopted after nearly 30 hours spent in committee studying the bill.

If passed, the CAQ said Bill 9 would better match job vacancies in the province with potential newcomers.

“We have, right now, enterprises having problems finding employees,” said Premier Francois Legault. “We have to put them first. We’re talking about economic immigration.”

In late February a judge approved an injunction that forced the government to keep processing pending applications until Bill 9 becomes law.  Legault said that with just three weeks left in the current National Assembly session, the CAQ’s timeline for the bill is in jeopardy.

“We would like to adopt it in June but we may need to wait until fall and let down companies because of the Liberal Party,” said Legault.