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Mar/1/22 4:09:53 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, although any scenario that would cause Quebec to lose a seat is unfair in my eyes, the Bloc Québécois's proposed fix goes too far in denying equity and will only trigger an endless constitutional debate that will ultimately benefit no one. The government is advocating for a sound, fair approach. We have heard Quebeckers' concerns on this subject clearly. We will work with all parliamentarians to ensure that Canadians across the country, including Quebeckers, and I am proud to call myself a Quebecker, will continue to enjoy strong representation in the House.

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Mr. Blake Desjarlais (Edmonton Griesbach, NDP)

Mar/1/22 4:10:50 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I want to thank my hon. colleague for rightly pointing out our agreement to protect Quebec in many ways and make sure it does not lose any seats. New Democrats stand firm in our support for this work. While we are at it, I have one question for the member related to the topic of electoral reform. In 2015, the Prime Minister promised to end the first-past-the-post electoral system so the voices of citizens could be better represented. Does the government agree that a proportional electoral system could reduce cynicism, especially now, and encourage greater political participation?

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Mr. Angelo Iacono

Mar/1/22 4:11:26 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, Quebec's place in the House is and must remain strong and stable, like its place in our Confederation. I also have to say that electoral reform would most certainly have an impact on the representation of the parties and the regional distribution across Canada. However, it will not change anything about the basic issue of Quebec's representation. Even with a new voting system, we would still have to decide how the seats would be distributed among the provinces.

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Ms. Elizabeth May (Saanich—Gulf Islands, GP)

Mar/1/22 4:12:09 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, in light of my colleague from Edmonton Griesbach's question, I think we need to look at the reason why we have division in our country. We, in the Green Party, think that the biggest problem is our voting system, which promotes a more toxic system and a non-collaborative approach and atmosphere among the parties. A proportional voting system would be more collaborative and—

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The Assistant Deputy Speaker (Mrs. Alexandra Mendès)

Mar/1/22 4:12:57 p.m.
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I must interrupt the hon. member to give the member from Alfred-Pellan the chance to respond. The hon. member for Alfred-Pellan for a brief response.

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Mr. Angelo Iacono

Mar/1/22 4:13:05 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague for her question. There is no question that our government supports Quebec's important place in our Confederation and in the House of Commons. However, we do not need extreme measures to do that. I want to come back to—

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The Assistant Deputy Speaker (Mrs. Alexandra Mendès)

Mar/1/22 4:13:25 p.m.
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I am sorry to interrupt the member, but we must stop there. Resuming debate. The hon. member for Berthier—Maskinongé.

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Mr. Yves Perron (Berthier—Maskinongé, BQ)

Mar/1/22 4:13:38 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, before I get started, I would like to say that I will be sharing my time with my colleague from La Pointe-de-l'Île. Clearly I am a generous man, because 10 minutes is not a lot of time. I am pleased to address the House today in support of the Bloc Québécois motion. The Bloc's motion states one very simple principle: when the electoral map is redrawn, Quebec's political weight must not be reduced. My colleagues opposite told us we had nothing to worry about because the number of MPs from Quebec would stay the same. However, if more seats are added elsewhere, the effect will be the same. This is about a percentage of voices, which has been in freefall since the dawn of the Canadian federation. Some members of the House do not understand our approach or what we want. I heard some exasperation earlier. One person said they were sick of listening to Quebec's demands. What is strange is that, last week or the week before—not long ago, anyway—the House voted unanimously in favour of a motion to amend a Constitutional provision for Saskatchewan. I pointed this out to members several times throughout the day, saying that I did not understand why they did not care about Quebec's status as much. If any of them are wondering why Quebec makes so many demands, the answer is because there is no recognition in this federation. When it comes to the federation, most MPs from other parties are hoping to convince us it will one day be ours too. Have they ever asked themselves why we do not feel at home in this federation? It is because there is no recognition, and that brings me to the ultimate goal, which has been there since the beginning. I would have liked to give a history lesson, but I see that in two minutes I have talked about a lot of things that are not in my notes, so I will refrain. The ultimate goal has existed since the conquest. Some will argue that I am going way back in time, but Quebeckers are a resilient, fighting people who have been struggling against assimilation since that time. Many circumstances throughout history could have led to their disappearance, but they resist. Why do they do it? It is because they are prepared to stand in a parliamentary chamber, speak for their nation and explain to their colleagues, in a friendly manner and will all due respect, that they will at least try to recognize the relative weight of the founding nation. I am not going to tell an obscure story, and this will take me directly to the year 1867, which is of course the year of Canadian Confederation. I would remind members that the previous Constitution was from 1840, that is, the Act of Union, which followed the Patriotes' rebellion and the Durham Report. The specific objective was to eliminate the French fact in Quebec. That was clear. In 1867, Canada was formed and there were four provinces. At the time, we represented 36% of the population, and I believe that our ancestors were sucked into the illusion of two founding peoples. If we look at who still talks about two founding peoples in this country today, we will find the 35 Liberals from Quebec, but apart from them, there are not a lot of people talking about it. There is more talk about multiculturalism and the fact that there are other minorities. Coming back to the problem, I will take the example of unanimous motions from the National Assembly of Quebec. How many times have its unanimous motions not been respected by this Parliament? To those who will respond by saying that the Quebec nation has its government in Quebec City, I would retort that I hope that it will be fully governed out of Quebec City one day. Naturally, I think it will, as do my Bloc colleagues. For now, unfortunately, Quebec's parliament is under the dominion of another Parliament, the one we are in today. If there is no decent representation of Quebec, the voice will not carry. I would go even further: If there is no decent political party whose mission is to stand up for the interests of Quebec, then the voice will not be very loud. Members only need to consider the number of debates on either language or culture that took place between 2011 and 2019. I would like those who enjoy mathematics to do the math just for the fun of it. I am not referring to the number of debates on Quebec culture, our language, our place, and respect for our laws from 2019 to 2022. Some will take up the challenge. I am getting off topic. To those who wonder why we are here to debate language, I would say the following. In 1871, a law prohibited French-language instruction in New Brunswick. In 1877, the same thing happened on Prince Edward Island. In 1890, Manitoba eliminated French schools. I remind members that Manitoba was originally created as a province for French-speaking Métis people. In 1892 and 1901, laws were enacted in the Northwest Territories to block French education. In 1905, Alberta and Saskatchewan were created as English-speaking provinces, despite having originally been developed and explored by francophones. In 1912, Ontario issued Regulation 17, which was in effect until 1944 and caused untold damage to the Franco-Ontarian community. In 1916, it was Manitoba's turn, and in 1932, it was Saskatchewan's. In 2018, Ontario legislation thwarted the creation of a French-language university in Ontario. All of this to say that the French fact and the Quebec nation must be represented, and this representation must be significant. Our voice needs to have an impact. We are already in the minority. There is no need to worry; we are not looking to take over the federal Parliament. We want to ensure that our voice will continue to be heard. I have a question for those who say that we complain all the time and are always asking for something. What have they done since 1995? What have they done after all of those emotional speeches, all those promises? Absolutely nothing has been done. Quebec has had no recognition. My colleagues can shake their heads, but we did not sign in 1982. That is what is happening. Now we are called whiners when we ask for something. Whether members like it or not, I should point out that 25% of the seats in Parliament for the founding people is a bare minimum. I mentioned 1995, but I could go back to the previous referendum in 1992, on the Charlottetown accord. Quebec refused to sign the accord because it did not think the conditions were enough, since there were other clauses. English Canada also refused to sign because they thought the accord gave too much. That right there is Canada in a nutshell. Being a nation means having the right to develop ourselves. As long as the Quebec Parliament is subject to the good will of the Canadian Parliament, it is vital that Quebec maintain a minimum weight in the House. We are here to maintain that. My colleagues will not be surprised to hear me say that I sincerely hope that Quebec will once again take matters into its own hands and ask itself the question again, and obviously I hope that the answer will be yes. When we do not control all of the political decisions and taxes, we cannot control the destiny of our nation. That is the issue. I look forward to my colleagues' questions. I hope they will not be aggressive, but I am prepared to deal with the substance of the issues, to get to the bottom of things, and I would like my colleagues to understand that this motion is not against anyone. We are working for our people. We are working for the survival of our language and culture. I made a list earlier of the laws that show that things do not work like that outside Quebec. For these last 10 seconds, I would invite my colleagues to really think about this and not simply vote against the motion because they do not want to give Quebec anything, as usual. Let us remember what we did for Saskatchewan a few weeks ago.

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Mr. Kevin Lamoureux (Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons, Lib.)

Mar/1/22 4:23:40 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I must admit the Bloc members are being somewhat transparent about wanting to see Quebec separate from Canada. I am not really hearing as much justification in their arguments as I would like to have heard, but one of the biggest problems I have is that I believe they have an alternative motive, and they are very clear on that. We get the same sorts of presentations from other jurisdictions on other concerns that they have. This one happens to be inside the House. Why should we give the Bloc any credibility on the issue? The simple reason is that it is politically motivated. It is order to ultimately see Quebec become a separate nation. That is the motivation for the Bloc. Personally, I believe we live in the best country in the world, and Quebec is a part—

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The Assistant Deputy Speaker (Mrs. Alexandra Mendès)

Mar/1/22 4:24:42 p.m.
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The hon. member for Berthier—Maskinongé.

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Mr. Yves Perron

Mar/1/22 4:24:47 p.m.
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Quebec is a part of that. However, Quebec must not talk too loud or ask for anything. That is the problem. I am being asked to give substantive arguments. In fact, the Bloc Québécois is here to salvage something from the wreckage in the meantime. It would be nice if the member would listen to the answer to his question. That is the least he can do. Well, in that case, I hope the parliamentary secretary has a good day. From what I understood from the question, the member wants me to provide arguments as to why Quebec should be independent. I have plenty of arguments, but I would need at least a half an hour, Madam Speaker—

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The Assistant Deputy Speaker (Mrs. Alexandra Mendès)

Mar/1/22 4:25:26 p.m.
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I cannot give the hon. member half an hour. I would also remind him that we do not mention attendance or absence in the House. We must avoid doing that. The hon. member for Nanaimo—Ladysmith.

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Ms. Lisa Marie Barron (Nanaimo—Ladysmith, NDP)

Mar/1/22 4:25:48 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague for his speech. I agree with the motion. In 2015, the Prime Minister promised an end to the current electoral system so that citizens' voices would be better represented. Here we are. Does the member not agree that a proportional electoral system might encourage greater political participation? I thank him in advance for listening to me speak in French.

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Mr. Yves Perron

Mar/1/22 4:26:23 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague for asking her question in such good French. We appreciate it. It was great. It is high time that the voting system were reviewed, in all parliaments for that matter, in order to better consider proportional representation. However, in any reform of the voting system, regional differences must also be taken into account. In a previous question, I mentioned the specificity of the three Canadian territories. They each have their own member, because these regions must be properly represented. However, the population, in mathematical terms, does not justify the member. We do not dispute that. We think it is fine. We want to apply a similar principle to Quebec, because we are francophones, we do not have the same culture, and we often do not have the same values. Sometimes we have the same values, and that is good. However, there are times when we do not share the same interests. That is all.

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Mr. Kody Blois (Kings—Hants, Lib.)

Mar/1/22 4:27:33 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, the way I see it, there are a couple of different ways we could come at this issue. The member for Saanich—Gulf Islands has suggested that we actually cap the number of members of Parliament. The Quebec representation right now makes up about 23% of the seats in this House. Quebec does have a constitutional protection of 75 seats, so there will never be fewer than 75 seats for Quebec in the House of Commons. Would the member support the proposition of capping the number of seats in this place, recognizing that Quebec's portion would never go under 75 seats, and therefore Quebec would always maintain somewhere between 20% and 23% of the composition of the House? When I look around from the perspective of a Nova Scotia MP, there is a lot of influence from Quebec, and I support that, and it is important, but would the member support the idea of capping it and then protecting, on the constitutional basis—

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The Assistant Deputy Speaker (Mrs. Alexandra Mendès)

Mar/1/22 4:28:23 p.m.
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The hon. member for Berthier—Maskinongé.

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Mr. Yves Perron

Mar/1/22 4:28:28 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague for the question. That depends on the way the question is asked. If the idea is that we will keep having 75 MPs, but they will represent 25% of the federal Parliament, I will answer yes. Today, we are not necessarily talking about a specific number of MPs. We are talking about relative weight. I have a lot of respect for the people of Nova Scotia, just as I have a tremendous amount of respect for the people of Prince Edward Island and so on. I mean no disrespect, but there is a fundamental difference that people need to understand. They must consider the nationhood aspect. Here in Parliament today, there is the Canadian nation and the Quebec nation. It is not the same nation. These are two nations that are inherently friends, that have a lot of affection for one another and that can work together. That is the reality.

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Mr. Mario Beaulieu (La Pointe-de-l'Île, BQ)

Mar/1/22 4:29:32 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, under the new proposed redistribution, the House would have 342 members, with four new seats, of which 77 would go to Quebec, who would lose one seat. This would cause Quebec's political weight in the House of Commons to go from 23.1% to 22.5%. It is not the Chief Electoral Officer's fault. He is mechanically applying the formula set out in section 51 of the Constitution Act, 1867. However, the number of seats is Parliament's decision, hence our motion today. This would be the first time since 1966 that a province loses seats in the House of Commons, but Quebec's weight has been going down non-stop since the coming into force in 1867 of the British North America Act, which became the Constitution Act. At the time, Quebec had 65 out of the 181 seats, which gave it a political weight of 36%. Today, since 2015, the Quebec nation has had 78 seats out of 338, for a political weight of 23.1%. Now it would drop to 22.5%, which is unacceptable. This is actually just the next chapter of the story that started with the Royal Proclamation of 1763. The purpose of the Quebec Act of 1774 was to prevent French Canadians from joining the American Revolution. The Constitutional Act of 1791 established a territory in which English Loyalists were the majority. Over time, immigration made Canada's anglophone population the majority. Things culminated with the British North America Act of 1867. Throughout Canada's history, British and Canadian governments have openly resorted to military suppression, anglophone immigration, the prohibition of French schools and all kinds of other measures to assimilate francophones and make us the minority. The people originally known as French Canadians dropped from 99% of the population in 1763 to 87% in 1791 and 29% in 1871. The percentage has been in steady decline ever since. As my colleague said, the Constitution Act, 1867, was followed by statutes abolishing French schools in all of the Canadian provinces that now have an anglophone majority. From the start, the Constitution Act, 1867, protected bilingualism in Quebec. The federal government ignored that for a very long time. We are still feeling the effects now with the Official Languages Act. At the end of that period, in the 1960s, the Laurendeau-Dunton Royal Commission on Bilingualism and Biculturalism was established. André Laurendeau sought to give collective rights to the Quebec nation, but that did not happen. The commission's work led to a multiculturalism act, which somewhat weakened the Quebec identity, as it was seen as one cultural community among many. The commission also resulted in a bilingualism act, which was supposed to protect official language minorities. In Quebec, the anglophone community just happened to be considered the minority, which until then had benefited from colonial privileges and had a very dominant position in Quebec society. Thus, instead of taking action to defend French everywhere, the Canadian government took action in Quebec, the only francophone state, and found nothing better to do than to strengthen English. Today, we are seeing the decline of French, which the Official Languages Act will not reverse. It is nonetheless surprising to note that French has declined with every census and that since the Official Languages Act was passed, the rate of francophone assimilation has increased across the country. The Government of Canada admitted just two years ago that French is on the decline and that it has a responsibility to defend and protect French everywhere, even in Quebec. That is not what we see in the Official Languages Act. Certain principles have been laid down, but the same old approach is being used. I think Quebec is caught in a trap. If we continue to welcome large volumes of immigrants and do not get these newcomers to learn French, francophones will become the minority in Quebec, and the federal government is contributing to that. If we do not increase immigration, Quebec will lose its political weight. We are trapped. Canada has no problem welcoming lots of immigrants, but we know that almost all language transfers among francophones and allophones are to English. I think everyone would agree that English is not at risk in Canada, but French is at risk in Quebec. The only way to survive and to react as a nation is to protect our political weight. With regard to Quebec's population, proportionally speaking, Quebec welcomed nearly twice as many immigrants as the United States and nearly two and a half times more than France. We have seen some projections showing that the demographic weight of francophones in Quebec stands to drop significantly in the next 20 years. However, with the new policy of bringing in more and more immigrants, that decline will happen even more quickly. We need to do something. The Liberals talked about increasing the total number of immigrants received to 430,000 per year. This is significantly more than the 280,000 immigrants the Conservatives proposed to take in. Quebec is a nation. It has an identity that is unique in the world, a history, a particular culture, a way of doing business, a common language. Peoples' right to self-determination is perfectly normal. It would allow us to ensure the future of our language, our culture, our way of life. It is what the right to self-determination is all about. Maurice Séguin, a historian who studied settler colonialism, said that if a people cannot decide for itself its own social, economic, cultural and political development, it is bound for dissolution. I think we have reached a breaking point. We were able to counteract our minority status for a while because Quebec had a very high birth rate, especially prior to the 1960s. However, much like all western countries, our birth rate has declined. We depend more and more on immigration. We need the means to promote the use of French among immigrants, but we are losing even that power. The Canada-Quebec agreement gave us a certain amount of control over economic immigration, but the formula has changed more and more, and the government is mainly giving permanent residence to temporary workers and students. We recently saw that there is a much higher refusal rate for study permits for francophone students from African countries. Basically, I think we are reaching a breaking point. If Quebec wants to continue to developing as a people, we need to at least be able to maintain our political weight in Parliament. That is why we moved this motion and that is why we are asking that any scenario for redrawing the federal electoral map that would result in Quebec losing one or more electoral districts be rejected. We are proposing that Quebec always be able to maintain its political weight at 25% because we are a nation. We are the only French-speaking state in America, and we have a duty to resist, to defend French and cultural diversity in the world. We will see the reactions here. I call on all my colleagues to allow Quebec to maintain its political weight. I also call on all my fellow Quebeckers to take stock of the situation. If we do not succeed in doing this and if we do not succeed in amending the Official Languages Act to ensure the future of French, the only solution will be for Quebec to become independent.

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Mr. Angelo Iacono (Alfred-Pellan, Lib.)

Mar/1/22 4:39:46 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague opposite for his speech. Before 2019, the quotas were approximately 50,000 immigrants per year. In recent years, that number has dropped to 40,000 immigrants per year in Quebec. I am wondering, however, why my colleague does not show as much passion for this issue when the Premier of Quebec, Mr. Legault, seems to be cutting the immigration quotas and reducing Quebec's demographic weight. Is it by cutting quotas that Quebec will develop as a people?

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Mr. Mario Beaulieu

Mar/1/22 4:40:33 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, first of all, the current Quebec government has not decreased immigration that much. It has more or less stayed the same. Second of all, as I was saying, we have two choices. If we increase immigration without sufficient means to teach these immigrants French and truly integrate them, francophones will become a minority in Quebec. If we reduce immigration, as the member said, our political weight will decrease. I think Quebec, as a nation, should be able to set its own integration policies for newcomers. It should not be penalized for trying to make sure it can integrate the newcomers settling in Quebec.

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