While defending his colleague who insulted Quebec researchers because they pointed out that English-speaking universities have an anglicizing effect, federal Liberal MP Angelo Iacono declared that Quebec should be officially bilingual.
Although this statement is surprising, it is faithful to the history of the Liberal Party of Canada.
When Trudeau senior passed the Official Languages Act at the federal level, he hoped that provinces, starting with Quebec, would do the same at their level.
The Bourassa government instead responded by adopting the Official Language Actthen replaced by Law 101, which made French the only official language of Quebec.
While this may seem less generous, it is nevertheless logical.
The scientific literature is unanimous: the best way to ensure the development of a vulnerable language is to make it the only official language in a territory where it is the majority, rather than making it one official language out of two in a territory where it is a minority.
Despite this, the federal Liberals did everything to fight the principle of French being the sole official language of Quebec.
They created a court challenge program that allowed judges they appointed to invent a rule according to which the English version of Quebec laws must be official.
Against the wishes of Quebec, they adopted a Canadian charter of rights to open the door of Anglo-Quebec schools to immigrants from other provinces and limit the principle of French as the language of business.
Result: after having progressed following the adoption of Bill 101, in the wake of the application of this Canadian charter, French declined.
In this context, some, like MP Iacono, want to go further and put an end to French Quebec once and for all.
