On June 1, 2022, An Act respecting French, the official and
common language of Quebec (the
“Act“) was adopted as law by
Quebec’s National Assembly. One of the articulated purposes of
the Act is to affirm that French is the only official and common
language of Quebec. To that effect, the Act makes many amendments
to various laws, including the Charter of the French
Language (the “Charter“), the
Consumer Protection Act and the Civil Code of Quebec (the
“CCQ“). The Act represents a
comprehensive reform to the previously existing French language
legislation, invokes such clauses of the Canadian Constitution as
to ostensibly permit it to override the Canadian Charter of
Rights and Freedoms, and is expressly intended to affect the
interpretation of every other piece of provincial legislation
applicable in the Province of Quebec in that each such other piece
of legislation…