Mr. Speaker, I am somewhat stunned by the words of my colleague from the Conservative Party. I say to myself that there must remain an old Conservative attitude, which for us Quebeckers and for French speakers in Canada means a certain lack of respect.
What the motion proposes is a minimum. We are asking for a minimum of cultural content. We are asking for a struggle against Americanization, against assimilation, against the ethnocultural disappearance of the French language. We are asking for respect for the French fact from anglophones in terms of culture.
In the past, this party abolished French schools at the provincial level: in New Brunswick, for example, in Manitoba, Ontario and Saskatchewan. It was not until 1995 that French schools once again became a reality in Saskatchewan, where I used to live. I am not surprised to see the Conservative Party here refuse something that is so essential to the struggle against assimilation.
What pride is there in criticizing a proposal that is actually looking ahead to make sure that the big American giant behind us, to the south of us, and everywhere, who is omnipresent, does not cause the Quebec identity, the Acadian identity and the identity of Canada’s other nations to disappear?