National Unity

It's both telling and pathetic to hear that the few elected Conservative Members of Parliament from Quebec are in a state of despair over their government's priorities and values that have been found wanting in the opinion of Quebecois.  These MPs fret that the Harper government with its emphasis on matters such as language, justice, the long-gun registry, environmental issues, have completely alienated French voters in Quebec.

Leaving the field wide open once again to the Parti Quebecois.  Whose leader has lost no time in making the most of her province's disaffection with Conservative policies.  "Every time (PQ leader) Pauline Marois attacks Harper, she goes up in the polls, and that's why she's doing so well because Harper is giving her all these targets to attack and she can just say: 'What are we Quebecers doing in this weird country of Harper's?"

What, indeed.  But then, the simple fact of the matter is, Quebecers are geared to an entirely other political set of values, most effectively expressed by the Parti Quebecois and reflected also by the newly-emerging 'values' of the New Democratic Party.  The Parti Quebecois emphasizes Quebec's uniqueness as a nation, the imperial value of its language and traditions, though not its religious heritage. 

And the NDP has found it good party policy to take up some of the more militant-stanced issues of a basically inward-looking community whose loyalty to language 'rights' and liberal-left values mark them as completely disinterested in a national union with the provinces that are mostly of English-speaking heritage. 

Traditionally Quebec has done fairly well in Confederation.  Its political influence has far outweighed its presence in population numbers as compared to the rest of Canada.  Its presence in Parliament represented by the number of Quebec and French-born prime ministers a case in point.  Its continual insistence that its particular needs never be neglected, yet another.

The criminal justice legislation, the matter of Senate reform, the re-allocation of House seats, the appointment of unilingual Anglophone Supreme Court Justices and federal Auditor General, the gun registry dismantling, the cost-cutting support to the arts, all of these issues have enraged Quebec.  But then, Quebec is forever in a state of perpetual outrage, seemingly convinced it is under-appreciated.

And while it threatens and coerces and fumes and fulminates, it grasps from the union of the provinces in a federal constituency whatever it can, insisting that transfer payments from wealthier provinces' resources and stronger economies simply represents their due, nothing more, nothing less.  Quebec has always been xenophobic and parochial.

It will never be otherwise.  The Parti Quebecois and the Bloc suffered a brief period of slackening attention on the part of the Quebec electorate.  Enabling the federal NDP to come straight up the middle.  And they did that by shamelessly catering to the endless whining complaints of Quebec.  To the point where the NDP agrees that 50+1 in support of separation is acceptable.

Maxime Bernier, now a junior minister for small business and tourism, alone bucks the trend in Quebec.  He demonstrated poor personal judgement that cost him an important portfolio.  But he has steadfastly proven his federalist loyalties, and more than accurately judged the political climate with respect to Canada and Quebec. 

It's a pity his political maturity is not more generally shared in his home province.