CAQ says demand for questions in advance was ‘clumsiness’

The Coalition Avenir Québec denies it has a policy of requiring journalists to provide their questions 24 hours in advance to get an interview with a candidate.

Mathieu St-Amand, a spokesperson for the party, chalked it up to “clumsiness” by volunteers working on Matane-Matapédia riding candidate Mathieu Quenum’s campaign.

St-Amand was responding after Quebec City newspaper Le Soleil reported that Quenum’s team told a local media outlet to send its questions 24 hours in advance so the party can decide whether it will grant an interview or not.

A member of Quenum’s campaign team who was quoted by Le Soleil said it was “CAQ policy” to require questions in advance and that it was done so that they don’t say “just anything.”

However, speaking for the party, St-Amand said on Wednesday that it was completely false. He said no such policy exists in the CAQ and said it’s “really a misunderstanding.”

Earlier in the day, CAQ candidate Sonia LeBel said she never personally experienced a situation in which the party controlled information.

“If you’re insinuating that there’s control, I never felt it, none of my colleagues felt it and I strongly doubt that it exists,” she said, following a press conference on an unrelated matter.

However, the former prosecutor refused to give her position on the principle of requiring questions 24 hours in advance. Instead, she said several times that it was necessary to maintain “team cohesion.”

Her colleague, fellow CAQ candidate Ian Lafrenière, offered his take based on his years as a spokesperson for the Montreal police department.

“It’s not a matter of … because I understand where you’re going — are we going to cast aside questions or not,” he said. “I think it’s important to know what type of question you have so I can find the right spokesperson.”

Presse Canadienne