Sovereignty not dead, but Quebec 'decided to get some air': experts
By Philip Authier, Montreal Gazette May 3, 2011 9:29 PM
Sovereigntists are licking their wounds, shocked and not sure really where to turn now that they have been reduced to a tiny rump of four MPs in the House of Commons. Photograph by: Christinne Muschi, Reuters
MONTREAL — It was all supposed to happen like clockwork.
Re-elect the Bloc Quebecois in Ottawa. Elect the Parti Quebecois in Quebec City.
After that, "Everything again becomes possible," Bloc leader Gilles Duceppe boldly announced May 15 when he spoke to PQ delegates at a policy convention.
The bravado is gone now. So are the seats. And the money.
Instead, sovereigntists are licking their wounds, not sure really where to turn now that they have been reduced to a rump of four MPs in the House of Commons.
Is it all over? It does not look good for the Bloc, that's for sure.
Gone are the generous federal research budgets, paid staff, chauffeur-driven cars, the right to stand up daily and try and discredit the federal system in the name of defending Quebec's interests.
All that was useful to the PQ and its ultimate goal. After nearly two decades and five successful election campaigns, it's got to hurt.
Duceppe, who quit the party leadership Monday evening in the wake of the debacle, had planned a news conference Tuesday but it was cancelled at the last minute.
After vanishing, he quietly deactivated his campaign Twitter and Facebook accounts. Bloc officials stopped returning calls.
Under media pressure, Bloc vice-president Vivian Barbot issued a statement in which she said the Bloc is not dead and will continue to represent Quebecers' interests in Ottawa "with the same rigour which has always characterized us," Barbot said.
She added that despite the loss of seats, the Bloc nonetheless won 24 per cent of the popular vote.
"Our party thus remains a significant political tool for a good number of Quebecers," said Barbot.
"You know people have often spoken of the disappearance of the Bloc but it has never disappeared," said Louis Plamondon, one of only four Bloc MPs who survived the NDP slaughter Monday.
But back at the sovereigntist mother ship, the Parti Quebecois, the mood was grim, the spin machine was in full swing to downplay what many say was a setback by "the cousins" in Ottawa.
Even if the Bloc was virtually wiped off the map Monday, PQ leader Pauline Marois denied Quebecers were turning their backs on sovereignty.
She argued the Bloc meltdown does not matter because sovereignty was not an issue in the election.
"Sovereignty is just as alive as it ever was," Marois said at a news conference in Quebec City.
She said the Bloc's 23 per cent share of the vote is still well below the usual score sovereignty gets in polls — about 40 per cent — so all is not lost.
Asked by a reporter point blank if the Bloc is dead, Marois dodged.
"Listen, we're going to take a little time to let the dust settle," she said.
Was the federalist side crowing? Premier Jean Charest played it cool, avoiding any kind of preachy triumphalism.
"Quebecers have shown an interest in re-involving themselves in the affairs of the country," Charest said.
"At the same time, sovereignty remains the legitimate choice of a significant number of Quebecers. As the leader of the Quebec Liberal Party and premier, it is a choice which I recognize and respect. The debate will continue essentially in Quebec."
Analysts interviewed by The Gazette said Tuesday that to conclude that Monday's elections means the end of sovereignty would be naive and simplistic.
The Quebec voter is a much more complex animal, as shown in this campaign.
On the other hand, there is food for thought for the movement in the way the campaign unfolded and in the results.
Universite de Sherbrooke political science professor Jean-Herman Guay said that for the first time in a long time, Quebec voters "were seduced without the seducer draping himself in blue."
What that means is NDP leader Jack Layton won Quebecers' hearts without promising a thing in the way of reforms to the federation. Layton made only a vague promise in the campaign that he would seek the "winning conditions," for Quebec to one day sign the Constitution.
Layton was equally fuzzy when Duceppe tried to box him in on the NDP's pledge to one day apply the Charter of the French Language to federal institutions.
"Over the weeks, the Quebec question, far from being a positive stake, became a source of boredom," Guay said in an analysis published in La Presse Tuesday.
"The Bloc's idea that it could maintain its legitimacy by posing as the only ones who could speak for Quebec, instead became a source of irritation."
Quebecers' desire for change also worked against the Bloc.
After 20 years in Ottawa and the same leader for 14 of them, "the Bloc became, for many, an old party which seemed to be marking time in the role of victim, constantly accusing the others of not respecting Quebec."
Universite Laval political communications expert, Thierry Giasson, said the tired worn-out impression was further reinforced when the Bloc trotted out such sovereigntist warhorses as former PQ leader Jacques Parizeau and union leader Gerald Larose in the dying days of the campaign in an attempt to stir up its sovereignty base.
Giasson said that was a mistake because the Bloc has always done its best among voters when it didn't talk too much about sovereignty.
Quebecers were happy to vote Bloc because they never saw it as a vote for separation. That is a provincial matter.
"I think Quebecers looked at this and said, 'I don't think I want to get aboard,' " Giasson said. "There was a definite backlash effect."
"People sensed panic. The Bloc trotted out this kind of forced line that they are sovereigntists and Quebecers and patriotic which seems to have repulsed many people.
"People said, 'No, no, I am a Quebecer. I am quite comfortable with my identity, I am proud of my roots, I'm French, I'm nationalist but I won't vote for you."
Giasson said that is a reaction the sovereignty movement will need to analyze carefully because it does not bode well for the future. The Bloc has already announced for a post-mortem caucus and executive meeting to figure out how it went so wrong.
Giasson adds sovereigntists have always had an affinity with the social democratic NDP because it resembles the left-leaning Bloc and PQ.
The vote was an easy transfer for many under the circumstances because people could vote NDP as the same time as sticking to their separatist convictions.
"I think they (Quebecers) aspired to something else and the NDP was deft enough to present an alternative of openness and the Layton line, 'give us a try," caught on like wildfire.
And nowhere did the line spread faster than during that old-fashioned social networking system known as the Easter weekend where families ate and talked about the campaign.
It fell right after the French debate when Layton performed so well, notes Jean-Francois Lisee, a former PQ adviser to Jacques Parizeau and Lucien Bouchard.
"At first, it (voting Jack) was almost a joke," Lisee says. "Then a challenge. In the end, why not? At Easter, over the chocolate, we were only talking about this.
'So you think this too? My uncle, who is red, does too. My brother-in-law who is blue, is going to. Soon enough, all of Quebec seemed up for it. Why not us?"
Lisee, who makes the argument on his blog, adds people need to consider the context surrounding the campaign, too.
Quebec's Liberal government is detested, so is the Conservative government in Ottawa. In Montreal, people want to flush the mayor out of power.
Why did they vote NDP?
"To escape, but of what? From prison? Exactly. The prison that is the status quo."
"Where will the escape lead us? Quebecers don't know. They think Jack is a good guy. He seems to understand Quebec.
"Are Quebecers less nationalist, less sovereigntist than before? Well, no. They just did what they felt like doing.
"The Quebec voter decided to get some air, lots of air. They have broken out of the routine, old habits, but they are still prisoners of Canada."
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