English debate question continues to draw criticism

MONTREAL — A question at the English-language federal leaders’ debate last week has become a major issue in Quebec, boosting the Bloc Québécois in the polls and drawing criticism from Quebec politicians, federal party leaders and the province’s media.

For people who follow Quebec politics, the widespread negative response to the question, which described two Quebec laws as discriminatory, wasn’t a surprise.

They say it comes at a time when many Quebecers are particularly sensitive to the idea that English-Canadian journalists, politicians and public intellectuals talk down to Quebec — widely referred to as “Quebec bashing” — and when the province’s popular Premier François Legault has successfully portrayed himself as the defender of Quebec’s language and culture.

“Personally, when I heard that question, I cringed,” Martin Papillon, a professor of political science at the Université de Montréal, said in an interview Wednesday. “Not because I thought the question was completely outrageous, but because I thought it was out of bounds for the anchor of a debate to ask such a loaded question.”

In the preamble to a question Sept. 9 to Bloc Québécois Leader Yves-François Blanchet, debate moderator Shachi Kurl said: “You deny that Quebec has problems with racism, yet you defend legislation, such as bills 96 and 21, which marginalize religious minorities, anglophones and allophones.”

Bill 96 is a language law reform currently before the Quebec legislature, while Bill 21 refers to the secularism law that came into effect in 2019 and bars certain government employees, including teachers and police officers, from wearing religious symbols on the job.

Papillon said he thinks many Quebecers saw the question as an example of English-Canadian media not taking the time to understand issues in the province from a Quebec perspective.

“Whether it goes too far, whether it’s a good use of public authority, or not, that’s a debate,” he said. “But the very idea that there’s a need for this, or that it’s legitimate for the Quebec state to develop its own approach to these questions is not a question.”

The suggestion that Quebec, in particular, has a problem with racism reinforces the widespread perception in the province that English-Canadian media takes a condescending tone when talking about Quebec issues, he said.

Daniel Béland, the director of the McGill Institute for the Study of Canada, said the question has been seen as an example of “Quebec bashing.”

Many “Quebecers feel that there are a lot of people outside of Quebec who think that Quebecers are racist, who portray Quebecers in a very negative way. So there’s a sense that Quebec is under attack,” he said.

Blanchet has been able to use that politically, he said.The