Unsurprisingly, the debates on immigration during the last provincial elections left little room for municipalities. However, their action is decisive in the reception and integration of immigrants. After all, it is in their territories that they mostly settle!
Municipalities are front-line players who contribute directly to building open and inclusive living environments. Their intervention in the zoning of places of minority worship, access to culture in libraries, or the fight against racial profiling is crucial for our new fellow citizens.
Despite the recognition by Quebec, in 2016, of municipalities such as local governments and integration partners, it is clear that we are still far from the mark. The new holder of the Ministry of Immigration, Francisation and Integration (MIFI), Christine Fréchette, has her work cut out for her. It would benefit from placing cities at the heart of its thinking and making them a priority for its next mandate.
The Quebec government has been involving its municipalities in the field of integration for 20 years through funding agreements, for example the Community Support Program (PAC) whose terms are now defined by the MIFI. Negotiated piecemeal, these agreements allow municipalities to support initiatives and projects, carried out in particular by the community sector.
Despite its merits, the CAP does not reflect the partnership approach to integration that was promised. By addressing municipalities as well as non-profit organizations and cooperatives, the program treats the main urban centers on an equal footing with the community organizations working in this sector. This nonsense is reductive for local democracy and neglects its potential for integration.
Moreover, the aid provided by the PAC is not permanent. It involves the continuous renegotiation of biennial or triennial agreements. This situation places the municipalities, and their civil servants, in a precarious state where one governs by sight. How to develop and consolidate a coherent and stable municipal public action over the long term in such a context?
The responsibility of municipalities in integration must be better recognized by the government. This requires predictable funding adapted to their activities in this sector, and even additional independent sources of revenue, which would go beyond the formula ad hoc an agreement valid for only a few years. The MIFI program for municipalities must be more ambitious.
Making municipalities partners in immigration also requires that Quebec specify its approach to integration and living together. It cannot do otherwise in a context where the Quebec government is jealous of its powers in this area and is wary of any form of cooperation between its municipalities and the federal government.
Taking note of the current vacuum, cities have already based their action on other sources of legitimacy, often insensitive to the national and linguistic context which is ours. By becoming members of the international network of intercultural cities, Drummondville, Gatineau, Montreal, Repentigny, Rimouski and Sherbrooke have adhered by resolution to the postnationalist principles promoted by European institutions. Quebec’s inability to provide them with clear directions that are in tune with their concerns is in question here.
The formalization of interculturalism would allow the government to affirm its commitment to pluralism, as well as its cultural and linguistic specificity. It would give municipalities guidelines within which to intervene in order to promote the integration, in French, of immigrants.
With or without Quebec, cities will have to play a greater role in this area. It is therefore to the advantage of the government to finally define its vision and finally adopt a partnership approach. After the regrettable declarations of the last elections, these actions would restore confidence in its desire to make Quebec a truly welcoming society.
This would be a good starting point in order to arouse unifying national pride.