[lg policy] Quebec: Lisée confident PQ will support less strident approach on language

[Harold Schiffman]

QUEBEC — The leader of the Parti Québécois says he’s convinced the party
will follow his lead and rally to a more moderate approach to the language
issue.

“Times they are a changing,” Jean-François Lisée told reporters Friday one
day after launching a campaign in the media to sell a new language policy
he says is more focused on what unites Quebecers than divides them.

In other words, Lisée says, the PQ needs to pick its battles, focusing more
on improving French in the education system and in the workplace rather
than nitpicking about the small stuff.

Up for debate this weekend at a party national council, the new policy will
not resurrect such divisive issues as taking away the right of allophones
and francophones to choose to attend an English CEGEP.

Nor will it try to strip municipalities of their bilingual status or deny
military personnel the right to send their children to English schools.

One language hardliner has expressed concern. Taking to his Facebook page
Friday, Bloc Québécois MP Mario Beaulieu, the former president of the
nationalist Sociéte Saint-Jean-Baptiste, charged that Lisée is not
defending French enough.

He accused Lisée of wanting to gut a good part of the old PQ government’s
Bill 14 on language, a bill he considered too mushy from the get-go.

“Can we allow ourselves to let the French language slide even further in
Quebec,” Beaulieu said?

He said there is a lot of “Quebec bashing,” when it comes to language and
Ottawa has done its share to poke holes in the Charter of the French
Language.

“People are aware French is threatened but because there has not been a
real (information) campaign since the Bouchard years, there is a feeling of
powerlessness,” Beaulieu wrote.

“It’s entirely predictable,” Lisée responded. “When you want to change
attitudes, when you want to reach a goal using more productive ways, more
fruitful ways, there are people who will hold on to the past ways of doing
things.”

Lisée said Beaulieu’s comments show the difference between people who
favour angry confrontations and oppose change and people who are open
minded, uninhibited and willing to evolve.

“I think the immense majority of PQ members want to move on to other things
and do things differently,” Lisée said.

Lisée mentioned former PQ language minister Louise Beaudoin has signed on
to his plan as well as another language hardliner, PQ member Marc
Laviolette.

“The important thing is language in the workplace,” Laviolette told La
Presse. “Municipalities and military bases are secondary, side dishes.”

But as several hundred PQ members started arriving in Quebec for the
council meeting, Lisée found himself defending the party
against allegations it is using legislature taxpayer-paid employees for
partisan aims.

The Journal de Montréal reported Friday the PQ has hired five liaison
officers using funds from the legislature but the individuals have never
set foot in Parliament.

They are, however, organizing political events and fundraising cocktails
around the province.

National Assembly regulations state political legislative employees cannot
work for parties at the same time as being paid by taxpayers.

“It’s a misuse of public money,” Coalition Avenir Québec whip Donald Martel
said calling on the speaker of the legislature to open an investigation.

But in a statement, PQ party whip Carole Poirier said the rules allow them
to place such employees in ridings because they are technically not
legislature issues specialists, which means they are free to roam.

“This is all political theatre,” said Lisée, later adding he was not
surprised such an attack arrived just as the party is headed into a council
meeting. “That’s par for the course, that’s normal politics.”

http://montrealgazette.com/news/quebec/caq-calls-for-inquiring-into-pq-use-of-taxpayer-paid-employees-for-partisan-activities


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