CANADA: Secession v. Survival

(5 of 12)

Québécois solution to the language issue has been to preserve French by restricting the use of English. A draconian law known as Bill 101, approved by the legislative assembly last August, makes French the only "official" language in Quebec.* Under its terms, all business with the provincial government must be conducted in French. All professionals, such as doctors and lawyers, must display "appropriate" fluency in order to practice in Quebec. Corporations will be monitored by a government board to ensure that French becomes the "language of work." To pacify English-speaking Big Business, the Quebec government has promised to tailor exceptions for some 40 national and international corporate head offices located in Montreal.

The most controversial part of the law deals with education. It radically limits the right of new residents of Quebec—including Canadians coming from predominantly English-speaking provinces—to send their children to English-speaking schools. Among Quebeckers, only a student with at least one parent who attended Anglophone institutions can attend; all others must learn in French.

The aim, says Quebec's Cultural Affairs Minister Camille Laurin, is "to make Quebec as French as Ontario is English." It is also a de facto move toward separation.

In the rest of Canada, the Parti Québécois' determination to break away from the confederation has created fear, frustration and resentment. "What more can the people of other provinces do?" asks Carrol Potter, a retired Canadian armed forces veteran in tiny Middleton, N.S. "We have a French Canadian Governor-General [who represents Queen Elizabeth II], a French Canadian Prime Minister and a lopsided number of French Canadians in the federal Cabinet in Ottawa [twelve out of 33]. Yet we are told that the French Canadian is still dissatisfied."

Gloom is particularly deep in the Maritimes, where unemployment ranges from 10.4% to 17.5%. Reason: Quebec's separation would leave the four provinces and their 2.1 million people with 300 miles of foreign territory between them and the rest of Canada. Says Premier Alex Campbell of Prince Edward Island: "We would have only our poverty to share with any other province still around to become a partner with us."

In Canada's booming Western provinces, separatism reinforces strains of a different kind. Western premiers are pressing for additions to their already considerable powers under Canada's founding British North America (BNA) Act of 1867. Among them: a provincial veto over federal decisions concerning natural resources, a greater say in the operation of the Bank of Canada and a hand in the appointment of Canada's Supreme Court judges. Says Manitoba Premier Sterling Lyon: "English Canada tends to see Ottawa's tunnel vision [toward Quebec] as distracting from real issues."

In such Western Canadian provinces as British Columbia and Alberta, the belief that the central government ignores their collective needs is virtual Holy Writ.

There are even Westerners who preach their own brand of separatism. Says John Rudolph, a wealthy, independent oilman in Calgary, Canada's oil capital: "If Quebec separates, Western Canada will become more important and will be able to