Legault: New bill to protect French language nothing against the English
QUEBEC — Invoking the memory of René Lévesque and Camille Laurin and his own bumpy upbringing as a francophone on the West Island, Premier François Legault is calling on a new generation of Quebecers to take up the torch of protecting French.
Grabbing a share of the limelight from his minister responsible for the French language, Simon Jolin-barrette, after the latter tabled a longdelayed bill overhauling the Charter of the French Language, Legault made sure the linguistic debate ahead will have his personal stamp.
Protecting French is Job One for the premier of Quebec, Legault added, even more so given the linguistic quagmire in which Quebec finds itself.
“It’s clear we must do more and action is urgently required,” Legault told reporters with Jolin-barrette on his flank. “This is a solid bill, a necessary bill and a reasonable bill.
“Adopting this bill will be the strongest act since the creation of Bill 101 in 1977. Forty-four years later, a nationalist government steps in to take up the mantle of the Lévesque government to present a new Bill 101.”
Both Legault and Jolin-barrette insisted the rights of Quebec’s minorities are respected on every page of Bill 96, “an act respecting French, the official and common language of Quebec.”
“It’s nothing against the English Quebecers,” Legault told reporters. “It’s about protecting French. And all the rights of English Quebecers will be protected.”
The sweeping 100-page, 201-article bill delves into every facet of French — from customer service in shops to the kind of commercial signs Canadian Tire can use — and is designed to halt the slow, steady decline of French, particularly in Montreal.
While there are new requirements for French services in stores, the familiar Bonjourhi greeting has survived the cuts, even if it irritates the political class to no end.
“Bonjour-hi is not covered by the bill,” Jolin-barrette said, recognizing a reporter’s loaded question a mile off.
Landing 16 months before the next Quebec election, the bill — one year in the making — took the opposition parties at the National Assembly off guard with its sheer scope. Some expressed irritation with Legault’s spin that Bill 96 is more balanced and effective than anything they could have coughed up.
Legault went so far as to describe his old Parti Québécois party’s vision — which would block francophones and allophones from attending English CEGEPS — “as extremist in my view.”
Reaction was swift, with neither minority groups nor language hardliners saying they are satisfied.
“This is a closed-in, narrow vision of Quebec that is increasingly distancing itself from the rest of Canada,” said Marlene Jennings, president of the Quebec Community Groups Network, an English community umbrella group.
“Bonjour-hi is the direct result of the government’s inaction (on language),” snapped PQ Leader Paul St-pierre Plamondon, who has been criticized for failing to come up with his own plan for language. Now he says it will be made public Monday.
Observers rapidly noted the bill is riddled with potentially litigious clauses. As it did with its state secularism law, Bill 21, the government is weaving the use of the Constitution’s notwithstanding clause into the fabric of the bill from the get-go.
Asked about the specific clauses Quebec is seeking to shield, Jolin-barrette answered: “There are a lot of things. It’s the collective work.”