The nationalist turn proposed by the recovery committee met resistance at the General Council of the Liberal Party of Quebec on Saturday. While some are open to it, others have wanted to minimize its scope.
This desire to reappropriate the nationalist label, associated with the CAQ for several years, was the subject of several interventions on the floor of the event, in Drummondville.
Some, like former liberal minister Luc Fortin, simply see it as a “return to basics”, as embodied in Jean Lesage’s “Maîtres chez nous”.
His ex-colleague, David Birnbaum, even went so far as to confide to journalists that anglophones might “have to make adjustments” in order to promote French in Quebec. A Quebec constitution, as proposed by the recovery committee, for example, could be an interesting avenue, says the former MP.
But other activists seemed outraged that such a shift was even being considered. “Is it necessary to go to the point of calling ourselves a nationalist? We are especially proud to be ‘non-nationalist’,” declared François Villeneuve on the microphone during a plenary to comment on the report led by André Pratte and MP Madwa-Nika Cadet.
Federalist “here to stay”
An activist from the riding of Jacques-Cartier, in western Montreal, was even more intransigent. “Quebec is a nation, but if Quebec intends for me to be required to be a nationalist in order to be liberal, that’s NO. (…) I remain federalist and I’m here to stay“, she said into the microphone.
For her part, an activist from Lévis stressed that the party should above all present itself as “nationalist-federalist”, in order to avoid confusing newcomers.
The president of the Laurentides political commission, André Leclerc, also shared his initial surprise at the proposal, even if he now supports it. The CAQ, he explained, defined nationalism as an approach “which divides, which separates.”
The PLQ must therefore offer a more unifying “liberal nationalism”, he asserts. “Today you resurrected my sense of pride in being liberal. In the last two years, I was, like many of you, a little confused,” underlines André Leclerc.
Crossed in the corridors of the event, a former advisor to Robert Bourassa and Jean Charest recognized that nationalism encounters a certain opposition. “Perhaps not a resistance in such a way that it will cause a break, but there will be people who will not agree, but who will rally. Otherwise, they will not be liberal…”, underlines Ronald Poupart.
Attack on Anglo universities
The difference between the Liberal and CAQ approaches was highlighted by the vehement criticism of the Legault government for its decision to double tuition fees for Canadian students from outside Quebec.
The interim leader of the PLQ believes that this is a “clearly unacceptable” decision that risks harming the Quebec economy by discouraging Canadian students from attending Quebec universities. “François Legault is a PQ player in the closet, and then, sometimes, from time to time, we see him come out. He is a PQ who likes to divide, who based his political career, his election on dividing Quebecers,” declared Mr. Tanguay.
Also present at the General Council, Antoine Dionne Charest also strongly denounced the decision of the Legault government. “It’s a frontal attack, not just against English-speaking institutions in Quebec, but against the English-speaking community,” launched the son of the former prime minister, Jean Charest.
“We are doing irreparable damage to Quebec institutions,” believes the man who participated in the PLQ revival committee.