Mr. Speaker, the bill before us is one of the steps the government is taking to keep the promises the Prime Minister made at the meeting of the no side in Verdun. The promises were made in the dying moments of the referendum campaign, when, for the previous two years, the government had systematically refused to discuss any constitutional matter.
Only the phenomenal advance of the yes side forced the Prime Minister out of his constitutional lethargy and into giving Quebecers the hope of reform and satisfaction of their traditional claims.
Quebecers, however, are not fooled. Now all of the evidence points to the fact that the Prime Minister's offers were tabled in a mad panic. For example, the last minute press conference. The phoney committee chaired by the Minister of Intergovernmental Affairs had not even finished its deliberations.
The Liberal caucus had not been consulted either, and was put in the picture only after the Prime Minister's press conference. The offers presented are far from having unanimous support from the other provinces. This is a put up job, and a bad one at that, indicating that the Cabinet was beginning to panic about the challenges to the Prime Minister's ability to lead.
Many political figures on the Canadian scene, particularly in Quebec, gave an extremely chilly reception to the proposal for a regional veto, which was probably a great blow to the Liberal government. What explanation can there be for such a uproar of disapproval in response to the Prime Minister's proposals?
While the Meech Lake accord offered all provinces the right of veto over constitutional amendments, particularly those relating to federal institutions, here we have the Prime Minister reheating an old amending formula dating back to the seventies and the Victoria Charter. There is only one tiny change, the percentage of population required for the maritimes. The reactions were more or less the same in all the rest of Canada. English Canada reacted strongly to a proposal dating back to a distant time we were only too pleased to think had been forgotten forever.
First of all, the premiers of the two most populous western provinces voiced strong opposition to this offer. In British Columbia, Mr. Harcourt was not terribly enthusiastic, and a number of academics in the province even suggested the Prime Minister would cause the birth of a separatist movement in British Columbia. To show you how hard it is to grant these veto powers, the Prime Minister immediately turned around and promised British Columbia it would have a veto too. All in less than 24 hours. If you want a veto, the Prime Minister has a drawer full and will hand them out to anyone who makes a fuss and does not like his proposals.
That is not the kind of veto Quebec had in mind. The same kind of reaction came from Premier Klein of Alberta, who was not at all keen to see Ontario have a veto while three western provinces had to share. He maintained it was unfair to one of the three richest provinces in Canada and a province whose population was increasing at the fastest rate. Need I recall the position taken by the Reform Party, which is opposed to special privileges for any province and in the case of Quebec refuses to recognize anything, not even a symbolic and meaningless distinct society with no legal validity?
In Quebec, reactions were harsh as well. In one of his speeches, the Prime Minister maintained that Quebecers would recognize themselves in his proposals and that these would respond to the aspirations of Quebecers. Obviously we are not talking about the same Quebec.
His comments now and during the referendum indicate that the Prime Minister no longer knows Quebec and that the fact that he has been living in Ottawa for more than 30 years has probably cut him off altogether from what is happening in Quebec.
His proposals were intended to satisfy Quebecers, but he made the serious mistake of wanting to please everyone. By giving everyone half a loaf, he managed to please no one.
Most political parties in Quebec either reacted very negatively or were not satisfied with the proposals or dismissed them out of hand.
When there is a fire in Quebec, the other provinces panic. They show Quebec a whole arsenal of firehoses, telling us we can now feel safe and sound, protected by the other provinces and this array of firehoses. Too bad there was not enough water in the hoses to put out the fire. What we are being offered is not the real thing, but Quebec wants the real thing.
As I said to a colleague yesterday, we want to be recognized as horses, but they recognize us as little ponies. A horse is stronger than a pony. Quebec claims to be that strong and powerful; it does not want to be seen as small, weak and disadvantaged.
Mr. Dumont's Action démocratique also argues that what Quebecers want is not mere motions or bills but real constitutional reforms.
Both the Parti Quebecois and the Bloc Quebecois have rejected the Prime Minister's proposals. Labour indicated that it was too little, too late. As for the very federalist Liberal Party in Quebec, all it had to say was that it was a step forward, but without any great enthusiasm. At a regional council held the day before the Prime Minister came out with his proposals, the Liberal Party in Quebec went much further in its constitutional demands.
The Premier of Quebec and even Mr. Bourassa before him would never have agreed to the Prime Minister of Canada's watered down proposals. Beyond partisan politics, however, the media's reaction was the most revealing indication of how the federal government's proposals were received. The editorial writer for Le Devoir refutes the federal proposals, arguing that enshrining this veto power in an act of Parliament would not really give Quebec its veto back.
Quebec would not really get its veto back because although its veto was recognized by tradition, the Supreme Court stated that Quebec never had a legal veto. This editorial writer points out that any government could very well revoke this act. Reform would probably make it a point of honour to do so upon taking office. The most telling comments in the newspapers, however, are in La Presse , whose chief editorial writer, Alain Dubuc, who is well-known for his pro-federalist positions, wrote that Quebecers want much more than that. He added that, as long as these principles are guaranteed by legislation, all it would take for Quebec to lose its guarantees is a shift in policies or a change of government. The Prime Minister's proposals are held up to ridicule from all sides and considered as plainly unacceptable, both by English Canada and by Quebec.
To conclude, I would like to add that the main problem with this bill is its very essence; after all, it is just a bill. As long as all the provinces do not agree on its principle, it will remain just a bill.
This simple bill has the same force in law as any other bill, which means that it can be repealed by any government, as it sees fit .That is its weakness and that is what we condemn.