‘Anxiety and frustration’: Demonstrators protest against Quebec’s language law

MONTREAL – On a scorching Saturday, demonstrators swarmed downtown Montreal to protest Quebec’s controversial language bill, demanding that it be scrapped to preserve the rights of Anglophones, allophones and indigenous communities.

The protesters, who rallied at Dawson College before marching more than a mile to the office of Prime Minister François Legault, made a last-minute plea against the legislation, which is intended to strengthen the province’s francophone charter.

Bill 96 is expected to pass this month and would impose stricter language requirements in workplaces and municipalities.

It also seeks to limit the use of English in courts and public services, give warrantless search and seizure powers to Quebec’s language regulator and limit enrollment in English-language university colleges, called CEGEPs, where students would have to take more courses in French. .

Several thousand protesters brought home the bilingual element of Quebec society on Saturday morning, chanting “Mon CEGEP, mon choix” and displaying signs reading “I am not a second-class citizen.”

Marlene Jennings, a former Liberal MP in Montreal, said Bill 96 “breaks the social contract” with Quebecers, while Robert Leckey, dean of the McGill University School of Law, expressed concern that it “will pass by.” stop” the constitutional restrictions.

“Anyone can use English and French in the courts of this province. It is scheduled in the constitution. And using English in a Quebec court implies having a judge who understands the language,” he said, addressing the protesters in English and French, as did most of the speakers.

Leckey was referencing the bill’s provisions that state judges no longer need to be bilingual and that a company’s pleadings in court must be in, or translated into, French.

Bill 96 also preemptively invokes the notwithstanding clause, setting aside the fundamental rights of equality enshrined in the Canadian and Quebec charters of rights and freedoms.

“You know you’re in trouble when you hear ‘No Prejudice Clause,'” sang Bowser and Blue, a musical comedy duo whose first concert took place at Dawson College in 1975.

Russell Copeman, executive director of the Quebec Association of English Language School Boards, said he supports efforts to protect the French language, but described Bill 96 as “discriminatory.”

“I think what you’re seeing is a deep anxiety and frustration that is quite noticeable in the English community,” he said in a telephone interview.

Indigenous communities are also concerned about the possible law.

“We are being recolonized again under House Bill 96,” said Kenneth Deer, an indigenous rights activist from the Mohawk Nation in Kahnawake. “We don’t force you to learn our language; don’t force us to learn yours.

Grand Chief Kahsennenhawe Sky-Deer of the Kahnawake Mohawk Council said requiring young people to be fluent in a third language, French, has colonial overtones and would make it harder for them to succeed.

“Trying to encourage young people to learn our indigenous language is a challenge in itself,” he said by phone.

“We always want to encourage our young people to reach for the stars. But if they want to be doctors, lawyers, nurses, any of those professional orders will now require a very strict command of French.”

The protesters streamed mainly along Rue Sainte-Catherine, where many retail outlets concerned about the impact of stricter language rules in the workplace are located.

The changes would subject companies with 25 or more employees to “francization” — government certification that French is widely used in the workplace. The current threshold is 50 employees.

Estimates from the Canadian Federation of Independent Businesses say that a business with roughly 50 employees would end up paying between $9.5 million and $23.5 million under the bill. Expenses range from fees for translation and legal services to administrative burdens such as creating a workplace assessment to ensure that French permeates every corner of the company.

More than a dozen provincial and federal Liberal lawmakers were in attendance on Saturday, including Quebec Liberal leader Dominique Anglade.

A group of student protesters in favor of Bill 96 waited for the demonstrators in front of the prime minister’s office. They had guitars and tambourines, and greeted the protesters with a blast of classic Quebecois songs by Jean Leloup and Gilles Vigneault.

They shouted “Vive le Quebec” and “Vive le francais” between lyrics. Protesters on both sides were draped in Quebec flags and several fights broke out in the 30C heat, but the general atmosphere remained upbeat.

Steban Carrillo, 21, a student at CEGEP de Saint-Laurent and one of about 15 counter-protesters, said French is under threat.

“As we know, in Quebec the working language is French, so higher studies must also be done in French, at least until university,” he said.

The bill’s requirement that CEGEP students take three core courses in French or three additional courses in French has others concerned, along with concerns about a two-tier educational system in which allophones and francophones in schools English college students would have to take proficiency exams in French while Anglophones take one in English.

“The bill attacks our fundamental rights to justice, to health care, to education,” said Celeste Trianon, a law student at the University of Montreal.

Eric Maldoff, a Montreal lawyer and president of the Coalition for Quality Health and Human Services, emphasized that without clear communication, adequate medical care is threatened.

“People are going to get hurt. Literally,” he said, noting that House Bill 96 would only allow health services in English to “historical Anglophones” and, for six months after arrival, to immigrants. “There will be errors in diagnosis, there will be an issue of informed consent.”

The legislation also raises questions about patient confidentiality, given the enhanced powers given to the Office quebecois de la langue francaise to search and seize files without a warrant based on anonymous tips, Maldoff said.

This report from The Canadian Press was first published on May 14, 2022.