Mr. Speaker, it is a great pleasure to participate as a member of the official opposition
in this debate on Bill C-110, an act respecting constitutional amendments, and more specifically implementing what must be referred to as a symbolic veto.
I am very happy to participate in the debate on this bill, because I was immediately struck by both its form and its content. Its form is a beauty.
This bill is being touted as a historic response to the Quebec people's democratic impulse, because, as you know, Quebec is mostly responsible for Canada's constitutional problem.
This bill has six pages, including three blank ones. Including the front page, we end up with the equivalent of about a page and a quarter of text as a response or a semblance of response to the constitutional debate that, as you know, has been hurting Canada for some 30 years.
The content of this bill is also a beauty. As for a symbolic veto, I am reminded of one of our greatest hockey stars, Guy Lafleur, who when questioned about his reasons for supporting the no side said in 1992-if I remember correctly-that he had interpreted the right of veto as meaning the right to vote. That is about the extent of it. Talking about symbolic, this veto will allow Quebecers to vote, and very soon, in favour of sovereignty.
This bill and this exercise seem totally improvised, like the spontaneous show of love-albeit at bargain prices-made to Quebecers in the last weeks and days of the referendum campaign, and they also lack depth. More importantly, it seems to me that this is a pitiful non-event from an historical perspective.
Let us not forget that this process by the Liberal government is meant to be the answer to the historical claims of the Quebec government and people within the Canadian confederation. As a Quebec voter and citizen who has had an interest in this issue for a number of years, I try to get a better understanding of what is going on by going back to 1954, when premier Duplessis led the fight against the federal government's unconstitutional interference in fields of provincial jurisdiction, eventually winning a hard fought battle to have the province collect a direct personal income tax.
This is truly an historical event, following which Quebecers became more proud, more assertive and more determined to gain full dignity as a sovereign people.
Then came the Tremblay royal inquiry commission on federal-provincial relations in Quebec and Canada. Then, in 1960, just after Duplessis died, we had the advent of a Liberal government, the quiet revolution, with all the good things it brought about, and Quebecers taking their future in their own hands through the government takeover of the hydro sector, the set up of the Caisse de dépôt, the Quebec pension plan, and so on.
In 1964, an eye-opening event took place: the Queen's visit. I was there. The police force deployed was larger than the crowd. That day was later described as the day of the visit of shame, in the city of shame, Quebec City, because the people had remained indifferent to this visit, which, unfortunately, led to what came to be known as the samedi de la matraque, or "Billy-club Saturday", of 1964.
In 1966, still in that historical perspective-and that is what we on this side of the House, let alone the hon. members on the other side, cannot understand-there was this collective surge. As early as 1956, the sovereignist movement, which then became established in 1959, came into play. In 1966, it was represented by Pierre Bourgault in the riding of Duplessis. Few people know that 39 per cent of the voters of this riding voted for Mr. Bourgault, who was the leader of the Rassemblement pour l'indépendance nationale , the RIN, at the time.
In 1967, a prominent figure dropped by on the occasion of the centennial of Confederation. General de Gaulle sent out the message, for the whole world to hear, that the people of Quebec did exist when he declared: "Vive le Québec libre".
The next year saw the foundation of the Parti Quebecois by René Lévesque. This was a turning point in our modern history. Two years later, with 23 per cent of popular support, the PQ won seven seats in the National Assembly. Three years later, in 1973, he got 30 per cent of the votes and 6 members, because of the well-known incongruities of our British parliamentary system. Three years later, in 1976, a sovereignist party was officially and democratically elected in Quebec for the first time in the history of the province and of the country. The 1980 referendum followed, with, even then, 41 per cent of Quebecers giving a mandate to the Government of Quebec to negotiate. The majority, unfortunately, decided otherwise.
At the same time, on the Canadian side, people were becoming aware that something was wrong. In 1963, the Laurendeau-Dunton commission was talking about two solitudes. We could have taken big chunks of the Laurendeau-Dunton report and read it here. It would have been extraordinarily relevant.
So we had the Laurendeau-Dunton commission, then we had the Macdonald commission at the end of the 1980s and then the Pepin-Robarts commission, an event in constitutional terms, but a dead end, because Mr. Trudeau, the Prime Minister of the time, did not believe in their view of things. Then there was the constitutional bog of the 1990s with the Spicer commission and the Castonguay-Beaudoin-Dobbie-Edwards commission.
As Mr. Castonguay will remember, these people were upset-which should give Quebec federalists food for thought-at the degree of willingness to recognize a Quebec people within Canada that they saw. Mr. Castonguay even withdrew from the commission at that point, and, as you saw in the recent campaign, he remained true to himself and logical, warning everyone that he
could not try to convince his Quebecers that Quebec should remain in confederation, so shaken was he in his deep convictions.
Continuing with the major landmarks in the history of Quebec, we arrive at the aftermath to the no vote in the referendum, the great initiatives of Mr. Trudeau, the unilateral initiatives which were condemned by the Supreme Court. Trudeau had to call in the provinces. Quebecers will all remember the Night of the long knives, when the Constitution was patriated. One of the instigators of this was the Minister of Justice at the time, then and still the hon. member for Saint-Maurice. He cannot plead ignorance of the harm that has been done historically to the people of Quebec by such actions, yet he does not recognize-it cannot be repeated in this House too many times, a place where the existence of the Quebec people is not recognized-that Quebec as a people and a culture does exist, whether the Prime Minister likes it or not. The Quebecois culture does exist, and this must be said.
All of the efforts now being expended represent one of the three little promises made by the Prime Minister, as he himself qualifies them, to Quebecers and to Canada in the referendum campaign. One of these was recognition of the distinct society, an empty shell; the second was a token right of veto; the third was the Minister of Human Resources Development's nice little present which will make the poor poorer and the rich richer.
A fine country indeed to invite Quebecers to remain part of. Everyone in Quebec is aware, whether our federalist friends like it or not, that they are a people making democratic advances, a people marching toward collective pride, a people prepared to say yes to their very existence.