Mr. Speaker, I notice at the outset how the member for Notre-Dame-de-Grâce—Lachine, usually so progressive in other areas, illustrates perfectly how the Liberal Party and the Conservative Party close ranks when the opportunity arises to give real flesh, form and substance to the recognition of Quebec as a nation.
As I was listening to the member from Notre-Dame-de-Grâce—Lachine, I said to myself that it is quite incredible that this party's demands do not even go as far as Claude Ryan's in his beige paper of the 1980s. Every nationalist in the National Assembly demanded the recognition and the primacy of linguistic rights—even in telecommunications in Quebec's case.
As a matter of fact, we must also recall, delving quickly into history, that the currentMinister of Transport, Infrastructure and Communities was an ardent nationalist when he was responsible for communications in the National Assembly. He was following in the footsteps of Daniel Johnson, Robert Bourassa and even Louis-Alexandre Taschereau, the Liberal premier who, as early as 1929, was asking for primacy rights. Now, we cannot say that we are going further than Claude Ryan's beige paper in the 1980s, which asked for overriding linguistic rights.
It is sad, and it is a good reminder that, if we are to learn a lesson from this debate, it is that, without the Bloc Québécois in the House of Commons, the voice of Quebec and its best interests would never be heard. Language is one of those paramount interests. Why is this so? Because just very recently, the latest census told us that, for the first time in our history, the percentage of people in Quebec whose mother tongue is French is under 80%. If we need to convince ourselves as parliamentarians of the overriding, non-partisan and historic need for Quebec to be fully master of its own linguistic house, we only need to look at the latest census.
Our grandparents learned that speakers of French made up 33% of Canada's population. We could read that in our history books not so long ago. The latest census tells us that, in Canada now, not quite 22% have French as their mother tongue. So, in this House, we cannot discuss the matter as if it were trivial. I call on all members to recognize Quebec for what it is, the linguistic expression of the French fact.