En français et anglais, SVP

It’s one country, so debates should be bilingual

So, let’s not do that again, shall we? The French debate, as it is routinely called, was broadcast live on all the main French-language networks, including Radio-Canada, in the traditional “consortium” manner. It had all the virtues of that approach — large reach, comprehensive coverage — and all the defects, notably the tendency of everyone to shout over each other.

This is not necessary, but neither is it accidental. The rules could easily be set up to prevent it — the moderator could simply be given a mute button, or perhaps a stun gun — but he or she isn’t because the people organizing these events think it makes for “great TV.” In fact, it makes for unwatchable TV, especially for those watching in simultaneous translation: not just five people talking at once, but 10.

But that’s not my complaint, because this wasn’t the French debate. It was, once again, the Quebec debate. It always is. Though Canada is officially bilingual, though there are French-Canadians living in every province — more than one million of them hors Québec — the French debate traditionally concerns itself neither with the issues and interests of the country at large, nor with those of French-speaking Canadians in particular, but almost entirely with those of francophone Quebec.

Consider the subject matter of Thursday’s debate. The leaders talked at length of how crucial it was, above all, to respect provincial jurisdiction; of the rules that might apply in some future referendum on secession; of the impermissibility of opening the dairy sector to foreign competition; and, of course, of that all-important question on which the country’s fate depends — whether women should be allowed to cover their faces while swearing the citizenship oath.

This is fast becoming the defining issue of the election in Quebec — the journalist Jean Lapierre says the vote there will be a virtual referendum on the niqab — in a way that it simply isn’t elsewhere. This is apparently regarded as a controversial statement in some quarters. But while Canadians outside Quebec also have views on the issue, it hasn’t anything like the same saliency as it does there.

There are no ads running outside the province like the Bloc Québécois’, equating the niqab to a horrible black gob of oil; no leader demanding the notwithstanding clause be invoked against it; no open divisions over it within the parties, like the ones wracking the NDP. Which may explain why, though unmentioned in the English debates, the subject dominated the French debate: if not in time, then in emotional and political impact. It got all the headlines, featured in all the post-debate clips and analysis.

Even the discussion of the economy was filtered through the assumptions of the province’s peculiarly left-leaning political culture. I can’t imagine a journalist outside Quebec taking precious time out of the section on the economy to ask, not about unemployment, or deficits, or the aging population, but capping interest rates on credit cards. Or, as a followup, subsidizing green cars.

That the debate is held in Quebec is understandable enough; that the journalists involved are drawn exclusively from the ranks of the Quebec media, perhaps as well. No one would pretend the vast majority of francophones do not come from that province, or that their concerns should not be addressed. If Quebecers want to debate these things, no one’s stopping them; the parties will respond in kind.

But these are national debates, involving national leaders, in a national election: among the very few opportunities anyone gets to see all the leaders close up, unfiltered and (somewhat) unscripted. The broadcasters hold national licences and are subsidized, Radio-Canada in particular, by the nation’s taxpayers. They have an obligation to address themselves on these occasions to the nation as a whole, not just one province — as do the leaders.

Or if we are to have a debate for one province in this way, in which the leaders are invited to flatter local prejudices and pander to local interests, then let’s have one for each of them. Instead, we have one set of debates for the English-speaking parts of Canada, and an equal number of debates for Quebec alone.

It isn’t that we shouldn’t see the leaders’ debate in French, on the same basis as they do in English. Of course we should. The days when any politician could aspire to lead this country without at least a basic facility in French are long past, and rightly so.

But we do not ordinarily segregate the two languages in this way in our national politics. The point, indeed, of national politics, is to bring the two languages into contact with each other. That is why the debates in the House of Commons are conducted in both English and French, with simultaneous translation provided for those who need it. It is why our laws are published in both languages, our court proceedings the same.

So why should the leaders’ debates be the exception? We’re used to simultaneous translation. We’re good at it. We needn’t go as far as the House of Commons, where politicians often switch back and forth between languages in a single sentence. We could merely alternate every half hour. But with both languages represented, the leaders would have to address themselves to the country as a whole, not one part of it or another.

With the whole country watching, it would be easier to spot whether a leader had said the same thing in one language as the other, or what promises he had made to one group of voters, to be paid for by the rest. They would not be able to tailor their message to one section of the country, but neither would they have to: the pressure to dance to the tune of one province’s voters — or, perhaps, one province’s media, as at present, would be the less.

Hold all the debates in both languages, then — not half the debates in one language, half in the other. This is not an English-speaking country with a French quarter, but a country whose identity is both English-speaking and Frenchspeaking, simultaneously and equally. Our debates should reflect that reality.

This is not an English-speaking country with a French quarter