Bloc demands apology from Trudeau for October Crisis
Party leader Blanchet points to suspension of civil liberties in 1970
OTTAWA— It was Pierre Trudeau’s “just watch me” moment. And the Bloc Québécois wants his son to apologize for it.
Fifty years after the October Crisis of 1970, the Bloc is calling on Prime Minister Justin Trudeau to officially apologize for his father’s use of the War Measures Act and Canadian military — at the request of the Quebec government — to quash terrorist activity in the province 50 years ago. In a motion it plans to debate in the House of Commons, the Bloc says Trudeau should apologize on behalf of the federal government for “the use of the army against Quebec’s civilian population to arbitrarily arrest, detain without charge and intimidate nearly 500 innocent Quebecers.”
The reference is to how Pierre Trudeau used the law to suspend civil liberties and sent in the military — uttering his famed quip “just watch me” when asked how far he would go — after members of radical separatist Front de Libération du Quebec (FLQ) kidnapped provincial cabinet minister Pierre Laporte and British diplomat James Cross. Laporte was killed and his body found in the trunk of a car two days after the War Measures Act was invoked.
The law suspended normal civil liberties, allowing for searches without warrants, arrests and detentions without bail, and for membership of the FLQ to be deemed a criminal act.
Speaking to reporters in Ottawa on Wednesday, Bloc Leader Yves-François Blanchet pointed to how hundreds of people were detained and interrogated during the crisis, and that thenProgressive Conservative leader Robert Stanfield criticized the elder Trudeau’s use of these extraordinary powers. So did NDP leader Tommy Douglas.
Blanchet argued parties that vote against his call for a formal apology from the federal government will show their pronouncements of respect for the Quebec nation are hollow.
“You cannot pretend to be deeply in love with Quebec without respecting this desire of Quebecers to receive some apologies from Her Majesty’s Government,” he said.
The Conservatives have already said they will vote against the motion, while the NDP says it supports it. That means the motion can only pass if the governing Liberals agree to make the apology — something the prime minister has suggested he won’t do.
In the Commons on Wednesday, Blanchet referenced Trudeau’s refusal — on principle — to consider sending in the military during the Wet’suwet’en solidary blockades this year and asked if that same principle should have applied to his father’s decision-making towards
Quebec in 1970.
Trudeau responded that the use of the War Measures Act and military was after they were requested by then-Quebec premier Robert Bourassa and Montreal mayor Jean Drapeau, and that the focus should be on the killing of Laporte after he was kidnapped by FLQ operatives while playing in his yard with his children.
“He was taken and assassinated by a terrorist cell,” Trudeau said. “Those are the events of the October Crisis that we should remember. Yes, there will always political debates around what happened, but let’s remember the fact that a Quebec politician was taken and assassinated in an awful context and we should remember his family and his service.”
Daniel Béland is a professor at
McGill University and director of the school’s Quebec Studies program. He said the Bloc motion appears to simplify the complex reality of the October Crisis, which he described as a seminal event in the history of Quebec nationalism.
“I don’t think you can just put the blame on the federal government,” he said, describing a sense of panic after the kidnappings of Cross and Laporte that prompted requests from Quebec politicians for Ottawa’s intervention.
But the crisis “still creates strong emotions” in the province, he said, describing how civil society has been alight with discussion during the 50th anniversary this month, including over a controversial new documentary film by the son of one of the key FLQ operatives.
“There is of course the death of one man, Pierre Laporte … and that’s a big aspect of it. But also the consequences of the War Measures Act and all the people who were jailed in a seemingly arbitrary manner — that’s also part of the trauma,” he said. “So there are different layers to this story.”
Quebec author Jocelyne Robert has supported calls from the Bloc and Parti Québécois for a government apology. Robert recounted how when she was 22, police arrested her and her husband and jailed them for 24 hours, during which time she said she was strip searched and interrogated for hours.
“I think on the level of principle, it’s important that the government recognizes that it made a mistake because I think it was an enormous mistake.”