Autonomy is eight years old | The Press

The CAQ government has given up on holding a “sectoral” referendum to repatriate immigration powers. Somewhere in a parallel universe, a person is surprised.

If François Legault lost it, it would be humiliating.

What if he won it? At best, the federal government would negotiate while trying to give in as little as possible so as not to whet the appetite of the other provinces.

It would take a long time. In the short term, the impact would above all be to legitimize consultations on the future of Quebec, to the advantage of the Parti Québécois (PQ).

However, the Coalition Avenir Québec (CAQ) was created precisely to bring together people who no longer want to clash around this issue.

Despite the rise of the PQ, support for independence changes little. It peaks at around 35%. However, the debate will regain strength between now and the next elections.

To fight the PQ, Mr. Legault does not want to play Captain Canada too much. To do this, he will have to offer something other than fear of the referendum.

He faces the usual federalist dilemma: ask as much as possible from Ottawa… while making sure not to come back empty-handed.

The hunt is on for small, concrete gains.

In 2015, the CAQ unveiled its “new project for nationalists”. Besides the reform of Law 101, few wishes were realized (secularism did not appear in the document).

Mr. Legault promised at the time to regain immigration powers. But before embarking on this adventure, he could exercise those he already has.

The “International Mobility” program for temporary immigration falls under federal jurisdiction. It is the most popular. However, lawyers maintain that the agreement signed with Ottawa in 1991 would authorize Quebec to manage it, or to co-manage it. This is worth testing.

The CAQ project also brought forward the “cultural sovereignty” previously mentioned by Robert Bourassa. How can we move it forward without reopening the Constitution?

We can :

• Negotiate directly with Ottawa to repatriate powers, as was done to put an end to denominational school boards;
• Take the initiative to use current skills to expand your scope. This was the strategy for Law concerning end of life care ;
• Increase the representativeness and influence of Quebec in federal institutions.

Last year, the Minister of Culture, Mathieu Lacombe, commissioned a report on culture in the digital age^⁠1. The authors are credible and their expertise is varied (Louise Beaudoin, Clément Duhaime, Véronique Guèvremont, Patrick Taillon).

We know that Quebec works are diluted in the ocean of the web. The report makes 32 recommendations. One of them consists of including in our Charter a right to the “discoverability” of French-speaking Quebec culture, and then applying it to foreign platforms like Netflix and Spotify.

There is, however, a pitfall. The Trudeau government has just adopted a law which will subject these broadcasters to Canadian regulations so that they finance and promote Canadian and French-speaking content. The Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) must now clarify its application in future regulations.

Quebec’s approach has the advantage of specifically targeting our culture. It would also be an insurance policy if another government tried to abolish the young federal law – Pierre Poilievre has equated any regulation of the internet with censorship.

In Ottawa, however, there is concern that adding Quebec regulations will create confusion. A foreign giant could also target Quebec to create a precedent by attacking its regulations.

The report believes that adding standards could instead add a layer of protection in the event of a lawsuit. It is also suggested that Quebec forge alliances with countries like France so as not to go it alone. But the most important alliance remains that with the federal government.

The Minister of Heritage, Pascale St-Onge, is a valuable interlocutor – Quebec will not find a better one in a federal party. But his job nevertheless remains to represent all Canadians.

Mr. Lacombe would like Quebec to be directly consulted by the CRTC. This is unlikely – the federal government will want to defend the independence of the institution. But we could agree to find a mechanism so that Quebec is better represented among the leaders of the CRTC, or even better defended in its rules.

All of these solutions, however, remain defensive. In addition to making culture visible on foreign platforms, Quebec could strengthen ours.

It’s not simple, however. In TV and cinema, the offer is scattered across different platforms. Few people can afford them all. We finance them with our taxes, then we have to pay again with a subscription…

A unified offer is unlikely – Radio-Canada, Quebecor and Bell are rivals. But compromises seem possible, such as submitting a program on a neutral platform after a certain period of exclusivity. Small independent players could also be strengthened.

According to my information, Minister Lacombe will launch a project on the financing of cultural productions. These are the kinds of questions that should interest him.

As we can see, there is no home run here. Only rather technical solutions with uncertain results. But it’s at least worth a try.

1. Consult the experts’ report on the discoverability of cultural content