While this week almost all attention has focused on the Elghawaby affair, the Trudeau Liberals have thrown back the French cause in Quebec.
It shouldn’t go under the radar.
Promise
Parliamentarians in Ottawa are studying “article by article” Bill C-13, which is a revision of the Official Languages Act (OLA).
This goes back to a liberal promise for which Mélanie Joly was responsible.
The minister said in 2020 that this law should now reflect the power imbalance of each of the official languages. This was even reflected in the speech from the throne in Ottawa: “The government therefore has a responsibility to protect and promote French not only outside of Quebec but also within Quebec. »
It was a “revolution” that I have spoken of here many times. The OLA has always followed a symmetrical logic, placing francophone minorities outside Quebec on the same footing as the (so-called) anglophone minority in Quebec.
Joly had filed Bill C-32, which died on the order paper when the 2021 election was called. After the minority Liberals were re-elected, Ginette Petitpas-Taylor inherited the file. A new version of the law was proposed, C-13.
It contained several setbacks compared to C-32, most notably in the application of Bill 101 to federally chartered businesses. In Quebec, Simon Jolin-Barrette tried to apply this measure with Bill 96 (which modifies the French language charter). But C-13 prioritizes federal law and advocates… free choice. The new French language minister in Quebec, Jean-François Roberge, seems to have given up on the matter.
unusual language
C-13 recognized in the preamble to the law that French is the “common language” of Quebec. Ottawa gave the City of Québec full latitude “with respect to its language planning provided for in the Charter of the French Language.”
But this week, all that is gone from the text. The change was endorsed by Liberal MPs Marc Garneau and Anthony Housefather, supported by new Democrat Niki Ashton.
The deletion of any reference to the French Language Charter was said to have been necessary because, according to Garneau (to Radio-Canada), Law 96, which modifies it, “discriminates against English-speaking minorities”.
Housefather, a former chair of the Anti-Bill 101 Lobby Alliance Quebec (since renamed Quebec Community Groups Network, QCGN), argued that federal legislation should not recognize Quebec’s Bill 96 because it contains preemptive waiver provisions. This could harm Ottawa if it challenges them in court.
Always this disturbing instrumentalization of “fundamental rights”; combined with a return to the strict (misleading) symmetry of the OLA. With the dishes that underpin everything. Meanwhile, French in Quebec is on the decline.
Even Trudeau Jr. could not influence systemic Trudeauism. What does Melanie Joly think? As for the CAQ, its strong mandate before the English-speaking liberal “minority” lobby does not seem to weigh. It is the one who leads the Dominion when it comes to official languages.
