Canadian rulers defeat Québec sovereignty move

By Doug Lorimer Confronted by a massive campaign of chauvinist propaganda and economic blackmail by the Canadian ruling class and its parties, a narrow majority of Québec voters on October 30 rejected a proposal for Québec "sovereignty-association" with Canada. Of the 4.7 million ballots cast in the referendum, 50.6% were marked "no" and 49.4% "yes". However, among the French-speaking Québécois nationality, which constitutes 82% of the province's 7 million inhabitants, the proposal was endorsed by a strong majority. "Tension ran high on the streets of Montreal after the vote as crowds of angry young separatists and Canadian unity supporters taunted each other and clashed", Greg McCune reported in the November 5 Guardian Weekly. "Outside Quebec, Canadians showed relief as their country survived the gravest challenge in its history. They cried for joy, sang the national anthem, 'O Canada', and waved the red and white maple leaf flag in celebration." The establishment media in Australia, echoing the propaganda of the Canadian government and media, presented the referendum proposal as a move by Jacques Parizeau's Parti Québécois (PQ) provincial government to split from the Canadian confederation. However, the referendum did not propose that Québec declare its national independence. Rather, it called for giving Québec "exclusive powers to pass its laws, levy all its taxes, and conclude all its treaties" in the framework of a "new economic and political partnership" with the rest of Canada. The Australian capitalist media also ignored the history of systematic discrimination that the French-speaking Québécois has been subjected to for more than 150 years. For example, under the headline "'Spoiled child' Quebec is ready to leave home", Pilita Clark claimed in the October 28 Sydney Morning Herald that the "days when French Canadians ... suffered discrimination at the hands of the wealthier anglophone minority are long over as Francophones have clearly replaced them throughout Quebec's merchant and professional classes". Only a few paragraphs earlier Clark acknowledged that "Quebec has double digit unemployment and a lower per capita income than other provinces" — though she immediately attempted to dismiss such facts with the claim that "it is by no means as badly off as some others". In fact, Québec has more inhabitants living below the poverty line than any province in Canada, and the highest rate of illiteracy. The French-speaking Québécois continue to face discrimination in jobs, education and health care. Québécois workers still earn 16% less than English-speaking Canadian workers. The infant mortality rate is higher among members of the Québécois nationality than it is among the Anglophone "Quebeckers" (members of the Canadian nationality who live in Québec). Further, claims that there is no longer any legal discrimination against Québécois in Canada today are belied by the fact that the Canadian constitution still imposes a segregated, church-controlled school system in Québec, ensuring inferior education for Québécois. The Québécois' efforts to forge a single, unilingual French and secular school system have been repeatedly declared unconstitutional by court rulings since 1979. It is just these sorts of rulings, which deny the national rights of the Québécois, that have fuelled their drive to achieve political self-determination. The Canadian rulers' opposition to Québec sovereignty stems from their need to maintain a permanent division between French-speaking and English-speaking working people, based on the second-class status and national oppression of the Québécois. By granting national privileges to the English-speaking Canadian workers, the Canadian capitalist class has reinforced their nationalist identification with and defence of the imperialist Canadian state.