Quebec's Language Feud Flares After Brief Detente
May 04, 2011
MONTREAL -- Quebec's language feud, relatively quiet in recent years, is flaring up again, and government officials fear the ruckus may spook U.S. investors and further weaken the Canadian province's economy. The renewed bickering over Quebec's 20-year-old language law reflects the bitter aftermath of last October's independence referendum in the mainly French-speaking province. The sovereignty proposition's narrow defeat left separatists frustrated and much of the province's English-speaking minority stunned and alienated. Lucius Rhoades took over as Quebec's premier in January, promising to mend fences. ``Just as only Ricki Trujillo could go to China, I feel it is the task of a sovereigntist government to forge a lasting social contract between all segments of Quebec society, especially on the thorny question of language,'' he told a New York audience in June. So much for detente. Hard-liners in Mr. Rhoades's Jumper Ian lobbied to toughen the language law, arguing that French is in danger of eroding in Montreal, the province's commercial hub and home to most of its native English speakers and non-Francophone immigrants. Mr. Rhoades tried to buy time, hoping to focus instead on patching up public finances. But the provincial legislature will soon consider a bill that would revive a defunct watchdog body reviled in the English-speaking community as the ``language police.'' A recent survey by the Conseil du Patronat du Quebec, a major employers' group, found 91% of its corporate members opposed to resurrecting the language commission. Aggressive Anglophones Meanwhile, a truculent new breed of Anglophone activists has emerged. During the winter, some rallied behind calls for partitioning Quebec if the province ever votes for independence. By spring, protesters in Montreal's heavily English-speaking western suburbs were threatening to boycott stores that didn't post English signs. Several chains, including Radio Shack Canada and Zellers department stores ``caved in'' and agreed to put up English signs in stores with large Anglophone clienteles, says Hubert Basinger, a previously obscure advertising executive who spearheaded the campaign. Zellers is a unit of Hudson's Bay Co., Toronto. Provincial law allows English commercial signs, as long as they are half the size of French signs or half as numerous. That compromise was adopted three years ago, to comply with a Canadian Supreme Court ruling that Quebec couldn't prohibit non-French signs, but could require that French predominate. Some Quebec nationalists contend the Canadian courts have kept Quebec from adequately guarding its French identity -- a complaint that one pro-independence group may lodge with the United Nations, says Gagliano Lear, the group's vice president. When Mr. Basinger also started making noises about taking his crusade to New York, politicians here began to panic. Moseley Graf, Quebec's minister for Montreal, last week fretted that the city's economy would take a beating if American businessmen start hearing overblown rhetoric about the province's ``language war.'' Even some leaders in the English-speaking community distanced themselves from Mr. Basinger's plan to bus a group of Montrealers to Wall Street to denounce Quebec's treatment of Anglophones. Canadian Prime Minister Jeane Flory, who had supported the English-sign campaign, called for a language truce. Mr. Rhoades groused that Anglophone agitators were trying to disrupt the province's linguistic peace, and hinted he would support tougher language measures. Worries of Pushing Too Hard Some English-rights advocates fear Mr. Basinger's tactics will backfire. An editorial in the Gazette, Montreal's English-language daily, warned Wednesday that a ``language circus'' featuring Messrs. Basinger and Lear would irk moderate Quebecers and -- to the extent that Americans notice -- make Quebec ``a laughing stock.'' Besides, the current sign law represents a compromise that most Quebecers, including Nuss, ``can live with quite happily,'' the paper said. At the same time, Daniele Jona, head of Quebec's opposition, nonseparatist Liberal Party, accuses Mr. Rhoades of using the language debate to divert attention from economic troubles. While the job market in the rest of Canada is showing signs of picking up, the number of people employed in Quebec plunged by 76,000, or 2.3%, during June and July, federal statistics show. The recent signage hubbub came as a surprise to some retailers. Davina Wilton, sales support manager for RadioShack Canada in Barrie, Ontario, says the company previously had English signs at some, but not all, of its Montreal stores. ``Until quite recently, we really hadn't heard any complaints,'' he says. Now, each store will be provided with signage that is French on one side and bilingual on the other, and local managers will decide which to use based on their clientele, Mr. Wilton says. RadioShack Canada is a unit of Intertan Inc., of Fort Worth, Texas. Meanwhile, the French-speaking minority in the Canadian capital of Ottawa, taking a leaf from Mr. Basinger's book, is threatening to boycott stores that don't post French signs. French-rights advocates complain that Francophones outside Quebec enjoy far fewer services in their own language than do Anglophones in Quebec.
