Pontiac’s MNA is concerned with the CAQ government’s plan to update the province’s language laws, particularly with how they will impact the English-speaking community.

André Fortin spoke to THE EQUITY on May 10 to share his apprehension with the . . .

changes to Quebec’s language rules. He said that one of the major changes that would come into force next year will directly affect businesses in their communications with the provincial government.

“First off, and this is a done deal, as of May next year, the government will only speak to businesses and other governments in French,” he said. “It’s an old [Parti Quebecois] bill that was actually passed in 2002, but that … no government since then ever put into force and the CAQ has decided to enforce this legislation. This will have a tremendous impact on Pontiacers who own small businesses, the farm community, the self employed citizens who would no longer be able to communicate to their government in English. For us in the Pontiac it’s obviously going to be a real challenge for a lot of folks and will impose, probably additional costs to small businesses who really don’t need it these days.”

He said he would be seeking clarification from his colleagues on this issue on how this change would work in reality.

Another change that Fortin was concerned with was a suggested move to re-assess the bilingual status of municipalities across the province.

“They have indicated that they would be interested potentially in removing bilingual status for municipalities who no longer have 50 per cent anglophone citizens,” he said. “Looking at the list of municipalities in the Pontiac … that don’t have 50 per cent of their residents declare English as their first language, the Municipality of Pontiac would be overly affected by this. It basically means that the municipality would no longer be required to provide services in English to their citizens … The law is murky on this, but if [staff] don’t provide [service in English], they certainly aren’t in contravention of the law at that point. A mayor or an employee of the municipality that decides to only serve the citizens in French could do it, if the government goes ahead with this.”

He added that other municipalities in the Outaouais, such as Chelsea, could also be affected by this change. The final issue Fortin said that he was preoccupied with was a potential crackdown on business signage.

“We don’t know yet what he wants to do, we don’t know how he wants to do it but basically, Premier Legault has openly stated that he would use the notwithstanding clause to make language laws tougher, especially on signage,” he explained. “All three of these measures are part of a vision by the CAQ to diminish services to the English-speaking population and for us, diminishing services is somewhere where you’ve got to draw the line. English-speaking Quebecers must be respected through this process, they must be consulted, they must be treated as 100 per cent Quebecers, and citizens of this province … The premier said he intended to use the notwithstanding clause, and when you use the notwithstanding clause to circumvent the charter of rights and freedoms, basically you are admitting openly and at the start of the debate, that you will … go against individual minority rights in the province.”

Fortin said that the CAQ had also publically mulled introducing a change promoted by his colleague Gregory Kelley, which would provide free French courses to any citizen who wanted one, but said that it was meant to smooth over some of the more controversial changes.

“We’ve had a bill on this issue for two years now in front of the house, the government could have called it at any moment, but what they seem intent on, or what they seem to be saying is, ‘We’ll introduce that probably at the same time we introduce the rest of the bill,’ … They’ll add something in there that would be a benefit to the English-speaking community in the hopes that the rest of the bill will pass more easily,” he said. “But if they were serious about providing French-language classes to every Quebecer, they could have called Greg Kelley’s bill at any point, and it would already be in place.”

The CAQ has not yet set a date for the introduction of their new language laws, but Fortin said that he expects it to come before the current legislative session is up in June.

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