By Ruby Pratka
Local Journalism Initiative
Two prominent members of the Quebec Liberal Party (QLP) relaunch committee are proposing that the party back the adoption of a constitution for Quebec.
Julie White, a former Liberal candidate for the Quebec City-area riding of Jean-Talon, and Antoine Dionne-Charest, a Liberal organizer and son of former premier Jean Charest who recently announced his own entry into the leadership race last week, are co-presidents of the committee for the affirmation of Quebec put together by the party’s national political commission.
“Members of the party’s relaunch committee went around the province and met with people in every region, and many people we met said they wanted Quebec to have a written constitution,” White said, pointing out that British Columbia also has its own constitution subject to the Constitution of Canada.
White said the proposed constitution would clarify the rights of members of English-speaking communities to health and education services in their language of choice, in a way that would make rights guarantees resistant to further erosion.
“Notably in the areas of health and education, there are already areas of confusion, particularly about the recent directive about health care in English. A constitution [would] add an extra guardrail to protect the English-speaking communities; [a government] wouldn’t be able to just pass a directive like that. A constitution is stronger than a regular law and it would show the importance of respecting these rights.”
A constitution could also make reference to other key aspects of Quebec’s culture and legal system, such as civil rights, interculturalism, provincial competencies and the rights of Indigenous communities, White said.
The idea is not yet part of the party’s platform; members will debate and vote on it as part of the leadup to the designation of a new QLP leader in 2025, “and then the next leader will have to add their grain of salt,” White said.
“We can be nationalist and federalist at the same time – the Canadian federation is the best place for Quebec to grow and create wealth, but that doesn’t mean we can’t affirm ourselves as a people,” she added.
Dionne-Charest, in a video posted to social media, said the project was a response to “the Parti Québécois (PQ), who want to separate us from the rest of Canada, and the CAQ, who want to divide us and stigmatize Quebecers who speak languages other than French.” Neither party was immediately available to comment on the proposal. However, Québec Solidaire (QS) and the hard-line federalist Canadian Party of Quebec (CaPQ) both panned the idea, for different reasons. “The QLP didn’t invent anything; this has been discussed for many years. On day one of a QS government, we would pass a law to establish a citizens’ assembly to write the constitution of an independent Quebec. This document would then be submitted to the population during a referendum. In our opinion, this is a much more democratic process and a more winning one for Quebec,” QS spokesperson Charles Castonguay said.
The CaPQ denounced the proposal as a concession to nationalists. “We need representatives who will stand up for the laws we already have, not waste time pandering to Quebec nationalists’ desires for all the trappings of nationhood,” CaPQ co-leader Colin Standish said in a statement.” Co-leader Myrtis Fossey added that a Quebec constitution “would protect nothing – It would only be used by Quebec separatists to try to legitimize their project, as another tool to support their claim that Quebec should be an independent country.”
“Thankfully, we already have a Canadian Constitution which takes precedence over anything the QLP, CAQ and PQ might try to impose on us, as long as we stand up for our existing rights,” Fossey said.