No more sons in neutral anthem

CANADA: Canada is embroiled in a row between traditionalists and modernists over the rewording of the national anthem to make it gender-neutral.

Under a bill approved by the Senate this week, amid arguments over grammar, voting procedures and the proper course of parliamentary democracy, O Canada is to be amended.

Two words are to be changed under the legislation, which requires only formal royal assent from the governor-general to be enacted.

The words ‘‘thy sons’’ in the second line, ‘‘True patriot love in all thy sons command’’, will be replaced with ‘‘of us’’.

Since O Canada was adopted as the national anthem in 1980, there had been 12 previous parliamentary attempts to make it genderneutral, but all had been defeated.

The music was composed by Calixa Lavallee after Canada achieved self-government in 1867, and the original lyrics, in French, were written by Sir AdolpheBasile Routhier, a judge, author and lyricist. Scottish-Gaelic and English versions were also composed.

Efforts to change the verse were spearheaded in recent years by Mauril Belanger, a Liberal MP. When he had an aggressive form of motor neurone disease diagnosed, the effort took on new urgency. He was partially paralysed when his fellow MPs voted it through in 2016, and they gave him a standing ovation.

However, senators were against the bill. Michael MacDonald, a Conservative, said the alteration was gramatically incorrect.

Liberals argued that the senators were acting beyond their proper powers by holding up the bill indefinitely.