QUEBEC CITY -- Opposition parties in the National Assembly are calling on the Legault government to be much more transparent if it wants Quebecers to adhere to health instructions.
On Wednesday, they demanded that Premier Francois Legault make the COVID-19 trajectory projections public.
"People need to be aware of what is going on," said Liberal health critic Marie Montpetit. "This is the only way we can do it; the government needs to communicate these scenarios."
On Tuesday, Legault affirmed that the hour was serious and that he was highly concerned about the increase in cases of COVID-19.
However, he did not announce any tough measures other than to say that four other regions were going from "green" to "yellow."
Parti Quebecois interim leader Pascal Berube said there are still many questions around the colour code.
"I have the impression that the colour codes (...) demonstrate the government's concern more than a gradation of measures," he said. "In Bas-Saint-Laurent, we turned yellow, but I don't know what that means. Then if we turn orange, I don't know what that means either. So this is more an indicator of government concern than of binding measures ahead."
Montpetit was also critical that details on the colour code seem to have been unveiled Wednesday morning on Twitter by a citizen, Patrick Dery.
She is asking the Legault government to quickly clarify whether these are official documents.
"It is not normal, in a pandemic situation, that there are these kind of documents circulating and that we learn that on Twitter," she said.
Quebec Solidaire (QS) MNA Sol Zanetti said he saw a drop in the public's confidence in the messages from authorities.
He said the only solution was greater transparency.
-- this report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 16, 2020.
