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[Delenda]

EDITORIAL

TheStar.com - opinion - Reading Quebec's mixed message

Reading Quebec's mixed message

Mar 28, 2007 04:30 AM

Quebecers cast a classic protest vote on Monday. They punished Premier Jean Charest's Liberals for failing to deliver promised tax cuts and better health care and other services, and crushingly repudiated André Boisclair's Parti Québécois for its obsession with yet another referendum.

Most Canadians will take comfort in Charest's narrow minority victory and the dramatic surge by Mario Dumont's conservative Action démocratique du Québec, if only because this outcome is preferable to a strong separatist showing. The PQ threat has collapsed, for now. But welcome as Quebec's realignment is, the voters' ultimate message remains a confused one, split among federalist, nationalist and separatist camps.

Yesterday Charest promised several times that his party would be "drawing lessons" from that message, without elaborating.

Who now speaks for Quebec, and how credibly?

Charest, the unapologetic federalist who has never truly connected with Quebecers? Dumont, who campaigned to break Canada in 1995 and who now envisages Quebec as an "autonomous state" within the federation?

Charest, to be sure. But his stature is diminished. The definitive answer awaits Quebec's next election, and only if that one clears the air.

Between now and then, Dumont's vague "autonomist" views will come in for tough scrutiny, as will his dubious pledges to freeze taxes, cut the debt and somehow provide better services. So will his obnoxious view that Quebec has gone too far accommodating minorities. That's all good.

In Ottawa, meanwhile, Prime Minister Stephen Harper, Liberal Leader Stéphane Dion and New Democrat Leader Jack Layton must adopt a wary approach to this new-found volatility. They should resist demands from Quebec's warring camps that might diminish Ottawa and the federation. Given that Quebecers are split, with the Liberals taking 33 per cent of the vote, the ADQ 31 and the PQ 28, Ottawa has reason to act cautiously.

Unfortunately, given Harper's decentralized vision of Canada, caution cannot be assumed. Harper has unwisely had Parliament declare Quebecers to be a nation, his budget provided $2.3 billion more for Quebec this year alone and he has promised Quebec a larger voice abroad.

The Conservatives now hope to reap the reward of extra seats in the next federal election. But beyond that, Ottawa's challenge will be to manage Quebecers' expectations as the province's parties try to position themselves as the best defender of Quebec's interests by drawing up wish lists.

Though Charest survived, two-thirds of Quebecers, including most francophones, endorsed nationalism, either in the form of Dumont's dream of an "autonomous" affiliated state or Boisclair's dream of independence. As long as his minority holds, Charest will be under pressure from his own party and from his rivals to demand more recognition for Quebec, more power and money. Far from ending the "Whither Quebec?" debate, this week's upheaval risks fanning it even more.

If that happens, Canada's federal politicians would be smart to avoid being drawn into a no-win debate about changing the Constitution, further tilting the balance of power away from Ottawa to the provinces, or cutting special provincial side deals. Any Ottawa politician who ventures down that road risks paying a high price.

When it comes, likely in a few weeks, the federal campaign in Quebec must serve as an opportunity to speak confidently to the "Canadian advantage" that two-thirds of Quebec voters, including soft nationalists, already recognize. There is ample room for debate about poverty, health care, taxes, the environment and other issues that touch people's lives.

But Canada's federal leaders should feel no obligation to get into a bidding war for the soft nationalist vote – and especially not when Quebecers themselves are struggling to decipher the message they have just sent.

[Delenda]

Dumont's lessons for Ottawa


Mar 28, 2007 04:30 AM
Chantal Hébert

MONTREAL–In the wake of Monday's seismic Quebec vote, the thousand-dollar question on Parliament Hill is whether Prime Minister Stephen Harper could match Mario Dumont's stunning performance in the next federal election. The answer is a cautious yes.

On Monday, the Action démocratique party emerged as the dominant force in francophone Quebec, finishing only seven seats short of the first-place Liberals in the overall standings.

Its meteoric rise is not just the product of a provincial micro-climate.

The same auspicious conditions could allow for a major Conservative expansion in Quebec later this year.

The Bloc Québécois woke up from the vote with a big hangover.

With its provincial ally relegated to third place in the National Assembly and the worst PQ showing in almost 40 years, Gilles Duceppe has little hope of mobilizing sovereignists around a common goal anytime soon.

The advent of another referendum on Quebec's political future has rarely seemed as remote.

As a result, the sovereignty movement is entering a long (and potentially divisive) introspective period.

The consequences of the loss of the PQ's title as default governing alternative to the Quebec Liberals have yet to really sink in.

When they do, sovereignists will have to think long and hard about whether, given public resistance to another referendum, they can hope to secure a majority mandate on the promise of one at any point in the foreseeable future.

To make matters worse, the Bloc lacks an issue to shore up its fallback position as champion of Quebec's interests on the federal scene.

Last week's budget was exceptionally well-received in Quebec. The Bloc gave it its support in principle in the House last night, thus ensuring the survival of Harper's minority government.

For all his talk of more autonomy for Quebec, Dumont did not ride to success on the back of the federal government.

On the contrary.

In various campaign interviews, he has repeatedly given Harper top marks for governance.

The absence of serious friction between the two levels of government made it easier for many Quebecers to break out of the federalist/sovereignist mould on Monday.

There is no nostalgia in Quebec for the years of Liberal rule on Parliament Hill, especially now that Stéphane Dion is at the helm.

Having earned his stripes on the unity file, the Liberal leader is closely identified with the polarization that so many voters wanted to turn the page on when they supported the ADQ on Monday.

The notion that a vote for the Bloc could help Dion prevail over Harper is one that Duceppe will have to work hard to dispel on the campaign trail.

Twice already he has had to refrain from censuring the Conservatives – first over the Afghan mission and then over the budget – amid complaints that he would pave the way to a return of the federal Liberals if he undermined the minority government.

So far, Dion has failed to energize his party in Quebec.

The enduring Liberal weakness outside the island of Montreal means that the Bloc cannot count on that party to outflank Harper on the federalist front.

On a more general note, both the Bloc and the Liberals are fishing in the same progressive pool of voters.

Finally, it is no secret that Duceppe could be interested in running for the leadership of the PQ if and when it next opens up.

But if the Bloc takes a hit in a federal election before the job is officially vacant, Duceppe's phone will stop ringing.

Meanwhile, both sovereignist parties are now in the same awkward position of propping up minority federalist regimes to avoid a risky premature return to the polls.

With this provincial election, Harper has likely reached the limit of the retail politics he has practised in Quebec since he came to office.

With his Quebec-friendly budget last week, the Prime Minister has come precariously close to a tipping point, beyond which his overtures to Quebecers might cost him more votes in the rest of Canada than they earn him in the province.

The good news for Harper is that Charest's difficulties have demonstrated that action on the federal-provincial front alone will not ensure electoral success in Quebec.

In the short term, the Prime Minister's Quebec allies will be more concerned with shoring up the governing credentials of their respective parties than with outbidding each other with new demands on the federal government.

As of now, Harper is more likely to expand his nascent base in Quebec with the same middle-of-the-road policies he needs to make new inroads in surburban and small-town Ontario than with additional side deals with his partners in the National Assembly.

[Delenda]

Quebec vote reveals deeper trend

Toronto Star
Mar 28, 2007 04:30 AM
Mark Abley

MONTREAL–An earthquake in Quebec politics? Undoubtedly. Something new and radical in Canadian history? Not in the least.

Monday's election results in Quebec have got people talking about the dramatic rise of the right-wing Action démocratique du Québec, about the unpopularity of Premier Jean Charest, and about the decline of the separatist Parti Québécois.

But there's another factor that's not being discussed so widely: The large and growing split between the Island of Montreal and the rest of the province.

Consider: In last year's federal election, Montreal did not elect a single Conservative. And on Monday night, Montreal did not elect a single member of the ADQ. More than that, most ADQ candidates on the island received fewer than 20 per cent of the vote. Two of them finished a dismal fifth.

Take away Montreal and you'd be looking at a very different electoral landscape today. Mario Dumont would be heading for the premier's seat, with the Liberals and PQ tied for second place.

Commentators in Quebec are now falling over themselves to stress the uniqueness of Monday's results. Throughout the 20th century, Quebec never had a minority government.

As PQ leader André Boisclair said in his concession speech, politics in the next few months will be "original."

But looked at from another vantage point, the Quebec election forms part of a wider trend throughout Canada and beyond.

Think of it as the revenge of the rural vote.

Stephen Harper, remember, runs a government in Ottawa without any representation from Toronto, Montreal or Vancouver – the three largest cities in Canada. George W. Bush won two elections while losing big in New York, Los Angeles and Chicago.

The political strength of both men comes from rural areas, small towns, mid-sized cities and the outer fringes of big urban centres.

We can see the phenomenon writ small in Saskatchewan where, in election after election, Saskatoon and Regina vote NDP while the rest of the province does not. Likewise in Nova Scotia, the Conservatives do poorly in Halifax yet dominate the rural areas.

Ontario saw the same thing a decade ago when Toronto declined to take part in the electoral triumphs of Mike Harris – a prototype, in certain ways, for Dumont.

Whereas Boisclair is a gay Montrealer and Charest a bilingual son of the Eastern Townships, Dumont is rooted in the oldest traditions of French-speaking Quebec.

He lives on a family farm near the unglamorous town of Rivière-du-Loup. His wife shuns the limelight and looks after the children.

In places like North Bay and Rivière-du-Loup, people tend to regard metropolitan life with a certain degree of suspicion.

Part of it involves the way we think in big cities: We're less likely to accept the authority of the Bible, more likely to believe we have a responsibility to help poorer nations of the world, and more willing to accept high taxes as a necessary price for public services.

But a larger part of the split, I believe, involves who we are – not just our opinions but our very identity. We're not just bigger; we're different.

In North Bay and Rivière-du-Loup, almost everybody's skin is white. Immigrants are few and far between. Gay people are equally scarce on the ground; most of them have moved to larger cities. Many women now work outside the home, but they're less likely than in major cities to define themselves in terms of their careers.

Don't get me wrong; I'm not saying that most of the people who voted for the ADQ on Monday are homophobic racists who want women to stay in the kitchen.

I'm merely suggesting the massive changes that have altered the very nature of our major cities have caused surprise, anxiety, even anger elsewhere.

It's easy, too easy, to sneer at those emotions.

In January the council of Hérouxville, a little town in rural Quebec devoid of Muslims or Sikhs, provoked widespread scorn when it voted to prohibit kirpans and full-face veils in school, along with female genital mutilation and other practices linked to immigrants. But the councillors were also affirming a belief in their culture, one that they feel is under siege.

In Toronto and Montreal, "we" has become an inclusive pronoun; it shows our embrace of cultural, sexual and religious diversity.

But in smaller cities, "we" is often brandished as a means of exclusion. The "we" in Rivière-du-Loup adore Dumont for the same reason the "we" in Red Deer, Alberta adore Stephen Harper. Not only does Harper honour their traditions, he also understands their fears.

The challenge for centrist and left-of-centre parties is to persuade people who live outside big cities that their voices can be heard, their doubts faced, their culture valued.

Tommy Douglas and René Lévesque found ways to do this. Who, in the 21st century, will match their accomplishment?

[Delenda]

Harsh realities hit home in Quebec

Election a 'real wake-up call,' Jarislowsky says
Sean Silcoff, Financial Post
Published: Wednesday, March 28, 2007

Laurent Verreault is chief executive of one of Quebec's most successful firms, Groupe Laperriere et Verreault. To compete, GL&V -- a global leader in technology that separates liquids and solids for mining, pulp-and-paper and water treatment facilities -- does some things a bit differently. Its corporate office is in Montreal, but the CEO works from his Florida condo. His three vice-presidents are in the U.K. and India; his son Richard, the president, is in the United States. GL&V outsources most of its manufacturing and is a "virtual company," Mr. Verreault says.

The good news for Quebec is that it remains the official home of this dynamic growing firm. The bad news: Just 270 of GL&V's 2,500 employees are in Quebec. A decade ago, most of its staff was based in the province. Look around Quebec and its new corporate stars, such as Gildan Activewear Inc. or the newly merged Domtar Inc., look like GL&V: The head offices are here, but most of the jobs are elsewhere.

After all, why would you create jobs in an underproductive, overtaxed and highly unionized province when "I can hire an engineer in India for $7,000 a year?" as Mr. Perreault bluntly puts it.

With Monday's historic election, Quebecers seem to have woken up, finally, to a few harsh realities that many in the business community have warned about for years.

The election of a minority centrist Liberal government with a right-of-centre Action democratique du Quebec led by Mario Dumont as official opposition -- and the worst result for the separatist Parti Quebecois since the 1970s -- showed that middle- class Quebecers accept that things need to change, and that the two parties that have run the show for the past 30 years need to wake up or die. "The right wing took power in Quebec," said Jean-Marc Leger, president of Leger Marketing. "It will be a more conservative province."

For the past four decades, Quebecers have looked inward, accepting the "Quebec Inc." model of heavy state engineering as an article of faith and forever battling the merits of federalism versus separatism. Voters this week turned the page.

"I'm very happy to have this [election result] happen," said Stephen Jarislowsky, chairman of Montreal investment firm Jarislowsky Fraser Ltd. "It's a real wake-up call."

Those changes couldn't come soon enough; Quebec is in no shape to weather the forces of globalization or the demographic crunch it is about to face. Quebec has one of the lowest birth rates in North America and its workers retire, on average, 18 months earlier than those in the rest of Canada. The provincial debt is $13,719 per capita, 51% above the average of other provinces. That will worsen if interest rates rise. Taxes on income and dividends are higher than the Canadian average; and by 2012, Quebec will be one of just two provinces to charge capital tax on borrowings by companies. More Quebecers are unemployed and on welfare than the national average. With 40% of its workforce unionized, Quebec is well ahead of the rest of Canada.

But Quebec governments have been unable or unwilling to make tough decisions; tuition fees were frozen for a decade, and the province's utility charges absurdly low electricity rates. Government intervention continued on a large scale.

Despite toning down his fiscal conservatism slightly this campaign, Mr. Dumont nonetheless pledged to ease labour regulations, balance budgets, pay down debt and cut taxes. He is in favour of raising tuition fees and hydro rates. And he addressed what he called "the major problems of Quebec society," which few politicians would have dared to do a few years ago.

Calls for tighter fiscal management and controls have slowly emerged recently; each year, the message seems to get a bit more palatable. Lucien Bouchard was all but hounded out of the PQ because the tough medicine he tried to deliver as premier was unacceptable to the left-wing 1960s idealists who form the core of the party.

Liberal leader Jean Charest found stiff opposition to his 2003 campaign pledge to cut taxes, shrink government and cut corporate welfare once in power, and he shrunk away from his promises. Two years ago, a group of 12 prominent Quebec citizens calling themselves the "Lucides" -- including Mr. Bouchard -- urged Quebecers to face the unpleasant fiscal realities. Now, that message has been heard, after Mr. Dumont delivered it across the province in ways that seemed to get through to the average voter. So, now what?

The ADQ will undoubtedly push Mr. Charest to table "a right-wing budget," Mr. Leger said, with more tax cuts and money for health and education. A strong show by the Conservatives in the coming federal election in Quebec would likely bolster the cause for change.

Beyond that, however, Quebecers should gird for an epic battle. Change is harsh and controversial and bruising, as fiscal conservative reformers from Margaret Thatcher to Mike Harris learned.

Claude Montmarquette, a University of Montreal economist and member of the Lucides, said, "If we have two voices, instead of one [bringing the message], it will be easier to do."

The prospect of two effigies burning, instead of one, may spread the political pain, for Mr. Dumont and Mr. Charest.

From his perch at the frontier of the globalization movement, Mr. Verreault sees that they have little choice. "People used to be protected by government. Today those barriers are gone. I don't think the government has done a good job explaining that to people.

ssilcoff@nationalpost.com




© National Post 2007

[Delenda]

Sizing up fallout from Quebec vote
By Lorrie Goldstein
Edmonton Sun
28 March 2007



Let's tally up the winners and losers -- and their respective dark clouds and silver linings -- from Monday's Quebec election.

Winner: Mario Dumont, now official Opposition leader and a serious contender for premier after years in the wilderness leading his conservative Action democratique du Quebec party, which favours "autonomy" but not separation.

Dumont's dark cloud? A big, no-name caucus, some of whom could explode on him by saying stupid stuff, the way a handful of Reforms MPs used to undercut Preston Manning in Ottawa.

Loser: Quebec Premier Jean Charest, reduced to minority status and on life support, after not only a lacklustre Liberal campaign but an uninspiring first term. Charest's silver lining? He's still premier.

Loser: Andre Boisclair. The Parti Quebecois leader not only performed below expectations since taking over the helm in late 2005, but led the PQ to its worst election showing in three decades, delivering a self-inflicted body blow to the separatists. Boisclair's silver lining? At 40, he's young enough to take up a new line of work.



Winner: Prime Minister Stephen Harper, who would have had his hands full explaining his "placate Quebec" strategy if the PQ had won. Monday's results weren't as good for Harper as a second Charest majority, but with the two biggest parties in Quebec now federalist and quasi-federalist, Harper can safely call a spring election if he wants. Harper's dark cloud? Calling a spring election, because for all the Conservative bravado of late, it's still a crap shoot.

Loser: Liberal Leader Stephane Dion, because had the PQ won, his credentials as an effective campaigner for national unity might have given his wayward leadership some needed focus. Dion's silver lining? Quebec separatism, while dormant, isn't completely dead, meaning it could blow up at any time, possibly reviving Dion's sagging fortunes.

Loser: The media, because while most predicted a minority government in Quebec in which Dumont would make significant gains, virtually no one saw him finishing a strong second. The media's silver lining? Pundits don't get punted for blowing the call. If we did, most of us would be out of work.

[Orzabal]

Heille l'Orzabal, la loi 101, c'est le Québec. Si le PLQ n'est pas prêt à y toucher et que le WI vote PLQ...c'est donc dire qu'ils se sont faits à l'idée.

Personne ne les a foutus dehors en 1976. Ce sont eux-mêmes qui ont sacré leur camp. Bon débarras.



Ce que je veux voir, c'est que le PLQ devienne le futur Equality Party. Que le PLQ soit relégué au parti du WI de Montréal.

Faux, ils se sont fait montrer la porte par un gouvernement de 76 raciste, et les pires red-neck sont partis, avec leur $$$ mais ça on en parlera pas trop hein Delenda, le trou économique béant qu'ils ont laissé....

Non, on en parlera pas, belle Delenda.

[Delenda]

Heille l'Orzabal, la loi 101, c'est le Québec. Si le PLQ n'est pas prêt à y toucher et que le WI vote PLQ...c'est donc dire qu'ils se sont faits à l'idée.

Personne ne les a foutus dehors en 1976. Ce sont eux-mêmes qui ont sacré leur camp. Bon débarras.



Ce que je veux voir, c'est que le PLQ devienne le futur Equality Party. Que le PLQ soit relégué au parti du WI de Montréal.

Faux, ils se sont fait montrer la porte par un gouvernement de 76 raciste, et les pires red-neck sont partis, avec leur $$$ mais ça on en parlera pas trop hein Delenda, le trou économique béant qu'ils ont laissé....

Non, on en parlera pas, belle Delenda.

Ils ne se sont pas fait montrer la porte par personne, même si c'est ce qu'ils auraient mérité.

Tout ce qu'on leur demandait c'était de nous respecter et ils n'étaient pas prêts à le faire! Trou économique mon oeil. Partis avec leur argent, qu'ils ont gagné sur notre dos, mais ça a permis à des francophones de monter aux commandes. Donc, c'était un maudit bon débarras!

[Delenda]

A new leftward vocation for the PQ?


The Gazette
Published: Thursday, March 29, 2007

The blame game has started within the Parti Quebecois, after an election in which francophone voters veered sharply away from the party.

Andre Boisclair, meeting reporters in a televised news conference the day after the vote, nailed his colours to the mast: He will stay on as leader, he said, and sovereignty is impossible for now, and so the PQ needs to rethink the sovereignty-or-bust platform it adopted in 2005. As he turned boldly to face down his foes within his own party, Boisclair appeared composed, even serene.

Those foes didn't go on television with their views. Most of them were circumspect in public. But the hardline independantistes are never far beneath the surface of the PQ, and their whispering campaign started speedily: To revive the flame we will need a new leader, one who is truly dedicated to our option.

So, even before the election results are certified, the PQ appears headed toward full crisis mode. Senior Bloc Quebecois MP Michel Gauthier announced his resignation yesterday, effective at the end of this session of Parliament. He insisted that his motive is medical, and not linked to Monday's results, but all the same the move heightened the sense of tumult in the movement. The debate will likely go on until a showdown at a meeting of the party's national council, in June.

However it ends, this will be a wrenching debate for the PQ. The current wisdom, in some circles, is that the PQ is a "generational party." There is certainly evidence that younger francophone Quebecers don't see sovereignty as essential, or even as a particularly good idea. Even if that view is correct, though, the old guard will not yield without a fight.

On the other hand, Boisclair knows that his position reflects that of some of his caucus. The celebrated new MNA Pierre Curzi, for example, said during the campaign that he would be in no rush for a new referendum.

This is all good news for those of us who reject independence and see a fine future for Quebec within Canada. But even if the PQ does firmly move sovereignty to the back burner, there is no place for federalist triumphalism here: Independence is sure to be part of Quebec's mental landscape for the foreseeable future. In the minds of many in this province, the independence option should be retained, gathering dust but always available in case the rest of Canada someday becomes too overbearing.

For now, however, the full rolling boil of independence fervour which nearly wrecked Canada in 1995 has cooled down to a gentle simmer. Now it will be up to the Liberal government, the Action democratique opposition, the federal government and the rest of Canada to create the conditions which keep the water temperature low, too cool to cook a lobster.

As we have argued more than once, a return to "normal" politics would be unequivocally good for Quebec. While Quebecers have obsessively and endlessly debated the constitutional framework, other provinces have debated more pressing issues and moved ahead with solutions, all within the existing framework. Now it's time for Quebec to catch up.

But where would a rethinking of the PQ platform lead? Away from the current damn-the-torpedoes devotion to a speedy referendum after a return to power, obviously, and away also, therefore, from using all the tools of government to promote the Yes option.

But what does that leave? What should the PQ stand for as it awaits winning conditions?

Pundits and professors will be deconstructing Monday's results for months, if not years. But one striking conclusion, reached by La Presse columnist Claude Picher, suggests an answer to those questions.

Calculating the average income of Quebecers in ridings won by each party Monday, he found this: in Liberal ridings that figure is $28,666; in ADQ ridings it is $26,449, and in PQ ridings it is $25,202. The differences are not enormous, but the figures are skewed by other factors: the Liberals won some heavily ethnic but not very prosperous ridings in Montreal, and the ADQ snatched from the Liberals two prosperous South Shore ridings where demergers might have been a factor.

Allowing for those factors, we can say that this election brought the National Assembly a taste of stratification by income (not to say class).

This is a natural consequence of voting behaviour uncoupled from the sovereignty question. And it usefully suggests that the new PQ - long backed by labour unions, don't forget - could become the party of the left in Quebec, growing by re-absorbing the voters lost this year to Quebec solidaire.

Some voices close to the PQ have already started to suggest that giving up on the dream might be a necessary, if painful, trade-off for safeguarding the social policies which the PQ has championed over the years.

The PQ has oscillated between left and right over the years, in an effort to contain the whole sovereignty cause in one party.

Now, as the ADQ's still-ill-defined version of social and fiscal conservatism rubs up against the establishment Liberals, there's room in Quebec for a party of the left. A party without a policy and a policy without a (big) party. This could work.




© The Gazette (Montreal) 2007

[Delenda]

Semble bien que pour les anglos, we're damned if we do and damned if we don't. Quand on vote PQ, on est traités d'être refermés sur nous-mêmes et racistes. Quand on vote ADQ, on est encore plus racistes.


Monday was a great day for xenophobia in Quebec

Herouxville went ADQ, as did many other backwoods towns across Quebec
DON MACPHERSON, The Gazette

Published: Thursday, March 29, 2007

Herouxville went ADQ in Monday's election. After voting Liberal in the previous election, the Mauricie backwoods village that put itself on the globe by warning prospective immigrants that it does not tolerate the burning of women swung to Mario Dumont's Action democratique du Quebec on Monday.

So did a lot of Herouxvilles across Quebec, urban neighbourhoods and suburbs off the island of Montreal as well as rural villages, on what was a pretty big day for xenophobia.

The fear of others wasn't the only reason why the ADQ went from five seats in the last legislature to 41 and official-opposition status in the next. There were other reasons to vote Action democratique, and not all 1.2 million Quebecers who voted ADQ felt threatened because a week before the election a sugar shack removed the pork from the traditional Quebecois fare it served some Muslim clients.

But anybody who just doesn't like Muslims, or Jews or Sikhs or immigrants, knew which was the most compatible party for which to vote - or to run as a candidate - in this election. Among the "Montreal values" rejected in what my friend Michel David of Le Devoir has dubbed "le RDQ"- for "le reste du Quebec"- was inclusiveness.

Action democratique was a dying party until last Nov. 17, the day Le Journal de Montreal splashed Dumont across its front page saying the "reasonable accommodation" of non-Christian religious customs "n'a plus de bon sens"- has got out of hand.

For Dumont, it seemed, no such accommodation was reasonable, and every one was a threat not only to Quebec's values but its identity. And if some people interpreted that as a coded message of hostility toward ethnic minorities, Dumont did little to discourage them from supporting him. He was a still boyish version of the George Wallace who ran for president of the United States as a third-party candidate in the late 1960s and the 1970s.

Once the official campaign was under way, Dumont rarely mentioned "reasonable accommodation." But by then he no longer needed to; the message had got across.

In the excitement over Dumont's breakthrough, an earlier victory for xenophobia in this election has been forgotten.

On the Friday afternoon before the election, the province's chief electoral officer, Marcel Blanchet, capitulated to intimidation and denied Muslim women their legal right to vote with their faces veiled as required by their interpretation of their religion.

It was not, he explained, that his original interpretation of the Election Act, to the effect that the women could identify themselves without showing their faces, was wrong. On the contrary, Section 335.2 of the act allows them to vote if someone else who does meet the usual identification requirements vouches for their identities.

Rather, Blanchet said, he was exercising his authority to overrule the law to ensure the "serenity" of the election, since he had received threats to disrupt the voting (as well as to his own life) in protest against his original decision.

Blanchet could have served notice that if anyone attempted to disrupt voting, police would be called to remove would-be troublemakers from the polling station and if necessary arrest him. Instead, he chose to violate his mandate.


The chief electoral officer, it says on his website, is responsible for "guaranteeing the free exercise of the right to vote of Quebec electors." Note that it doesn't say "most Quebec electors, except for minorities, if somebody threatens to disrupt the serenity of the voting if they try to exercise that right." He's supposed to guarantee the right to vote of every single elector, including one whose interpretation of her religion requires her to vote with her face covered, for whom the legislator has made provisions.

The Journal de Montreal, which had done much to whip up hysteria over this and previous "accommodations" (most of them quite reasonable, in fact) crowed that "the public" had forced the chief electoral officer to back down. Actually, it was more like a mob of emailers.

Monday was a good day for xenophobia. For democracy, not so much.


****dmacpher@thegazette.canwest.com




© The Gazette (Montreal) 2007

[Delenda]

Euphoria over Quebec election already fading

By James Travers

Toronto Star
More articles by this columnist

Ottawa (Mar 29, 2007)

Sober second thought isn't exclusive to the Senate. A country celebrated for pushing moderation to an extreme enjoys taking its sweet time reaching conclusions.

Last Monday's federal budget and this week's Quebec election are captives of that custom. It took five angry premiers and Jean Charest's too-clever tax cut to impose perspective on the Conservative pre-election fiscal plan.

A few days and considerable reflection are now attaching asterisks to what at first seemed like resounding victories for federalism and the prime minister.

Even if premature, the immediate euphoria is easily excused.

Reducing the Parti Quebecois to third place and the prospect of another sovereignty referendum to a distant speck are about as good as it gets for federalists. And the similarities, as well as the synergies, between Stephen Harper's Conservatives and Mario Dumont's ADQ may well be the straws to break the back of a federal minority administration dying to die.

But that optimism is poorly matched against Quebec election math. Adding separatists to those supporting Dumont's autonomy philosophy equals a vision of the country most Canadians won't accept.

It's also true the characteristics shared by Conservatives and Action democratique du Quebec don't improve with reflection. Both appeal to regional and rural voters whose sensibilities are anachronisms for much of the Canadian majority now living downtown.

Inevitably, those realities will move from the federal political foreground.

What seemed like a decisive blow against separatism on Monday will almost certainly become a series of jabs at federalism as every Quebec party struggles to position itself as the principal defender of provincial interests. And voters who first used Conservatives and then the ADQ to beat sense into federal and provincial Liberals will increasingly be confronted with the other implications of their actions.

That's as it should be.

Anything that attracts thoughtful attention to the loose, sum-of-its-parts Canada that this prime minister is aggressively if surreptitiously advancing is a positive, even if the prospect of more federal-provincial conflict is about as appealing as a day with the dentist.(tiens, tiens, on se sert des citations de Parizeau quand ça fait notre affaire, hein?) It's no less important that voters consider and then reconsider the core characteristics of parties that the throw-the-bums-out cycle eventually put in power.

But what's good for the country and for democracy isn't good for the ruling party or for this prime minister's chances of securing a majority. It is to Conservative advantage if Canadians head to the polls convinced separatism is on the run, not that Quebec nationalism is on the rise, and believing Harper is a strong leader, not worrying about where he will force-march the country.

An inescapable fact of political life exacerbates those twin dynamics: time is never -- well, hardly ever -- on the government's side. Events as predictable as a deadly Afghanistan fighting season and as unforeseeable as a ministerial fall from grace are the tenterhooks on which political fate hangs.

There are now only two certainties for the prime minister. One is that continued scrutiny will as surely take the glitter off the Quebec election as it did the federal budget. The other is that Liberal disarray won't last forever.

True, Stephane Dion's metamorphose from academic to tactician is taking so long even his supporters now wonder if a leader will ever emerge from the chrysalis. But a party steeped in winning will eventually impose on Dion the discipline and machinery that it forced even Pierre Trudeau to accept.

While Canada's former governing party is getting its act back together, voters and taxpayers may start asking familiar questions that won't get any easier for Conservatives to answer. Does the prime minister speak for Canada or is Ottawa just the ATM for the provinces? Are the values Harper shares with Dumont the country's values?

It would be presumptuous as well as premature to prejudge the responses. Recent events teach that guiding assumptions about politicians, the parties they lead and the policies they can successfully proselytize are at best dubious and at worst invalid.

It remains to be seen if that's symptomatic of a lasting political shift or just the temporary lassitude of a country tired of fighting both with itself and over what it believes. But there's no obvious advantage in Harper waiting for desultory voters to think longer or harder about what just happened in Quebec and how that will help him secure the unfettered control that still makes the majority queasy.

Helpful as well as habitual for the rest of us, sober second thought is the last thing the prime minister needs now.

jtravers@thespec.com