THE organisers of the Formula One motor racing circuit had long anticipated that their Grand Prix in Bahrain, whose government crushed a protest movement last year, would be the biggest headache on their 2012 schedule. Yet the biggest disruption to the programme may well take place in Canada instead, where Montreal, the site of a race due on June 8th-10th, has been wracked by demonstrations over university tuition.
Ever since the Quebec government announced a plan to raise annual fees by a total of C$1,625 ($1,600) over five years, student groups have been protesting to demand a freeze. On May 5th negotiators for the province and the demonstrators reached a tentative deal to end the conflict, which would have offered new bursaries, stretched the increase out over a longer period of time and offset part of it with cuts to other fees. However, the student groups quickly voted it down.
Since then, low-level violence has raged throughout the province. On May 19th and 20th marchers meandered through downtown Montreal, barricading streets, throwing rocks and bricks and breaking windows. Over 300 people were arrested and more than 20 were injured. Earlier this month riot police broke up protests at a junior college in the city that was preventing the school from opening, and masked demonstrators rampaged through the Université du Québec à Montréal, breaking into classrooms with drums and whistles and screaming.
The government has responded with stricter laws to maintain public order. Any group of more than 50 people must now give police eight hours' notice of a planned demonstration, including its route and start and finish times. Protests near schools have been banned outright. Violators face fines of up to C$35,000 for student leaders and C$150,000 for their organisations. The city of Montreal also prohibited demonstrators from wearing masks.
These measures have angered civil libertarians and helped the students win sympathy from some prominent supporters. Arcade Fire, a rock band from Montreal, played with Mick Jagger on television on May 19th wearing the red cloth square that the protesters have adopted as their logo. Filmmakers from Quebec at the Cannes film festival also donned it. Critics plan to go to court to challenge the laws, but the cases are unlikely to reach the Supreme Court before they expire in 2013.
Nonetheless, the broader public remains on the government's side: polls show about two-third of Quebeckers support the tuition increase. The stalemate seems unlikely to end before the racecars start their engines.
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University students resorting to self-righteous violence when they can't get others to pay for their bills - these teenage thugs and terrorists should be expelled from the universities, until and unless they post videos on the youtube showing their public apologies to society.
Said poll had been done before the law had been revealed to the public, and as been openly qualified as not representative of the population.
more recent polls talk about 25% for a hike, 45% for pegging tuitions to the inflation and 20% for a complete freeze. (published by Radio-Canada/ CBC, the state run broadcoast).
The article fails to mention that the government offered to have the rectors and their peers review universities and cegeps (junior colleges and trade schools). That's like having bank directors inspecting the safes.
Seriously, I am glad that these protests are occurring, not because a tuition hike is unwarranted, but rather because it reflects a deeper ill in Quebec society - overtaxation. When half of your income is taken from you by the government, when all full-time positions are being replaced by contractual work, when you are asked by your doctors to go to the private sector when a quarter of your income goes to the public medical system, then nothing is free. Everything has a cost.
The heads of the universities are overpaid, universities need to justify why they are involved in real estate, and whether the diplomas will help improve the lives of their clients. Until the universities are reformed, it makes no sense to ask the client to pay for more when his expectations are at an all-time low.
In fact, I hope that private accounting firms are brought in to identify graft, redundancies, conflicts of interest and so on.
Administrators, who are in fact bureaucrats, grant themselves huge bonuses when all they usually do is manage a local trade school (cegep). Why the Cegep de Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu is involved in international affairs is beyond me. And yes, please check their restaurant receipts! They can be fired more easily with justification!
A lot of youth seem focused on their ‘rights’ but conveniently forget that rights must always be balanced with responsibilities, that is *obligations*. The more that your activities are subsidized by the State, the greater your responsibilities are to achieve something significant with that money. If you pay for your education yourself then it is totally your business how much effort you put in and what your degree of success is, for you can squander your money as you see fit. If the State completely funds your education, on the other hand, then you have a *responsibility* to put maximal effort forth and to achieve exemplary results because you have a responsibility not to squander that money.
That is the scale that those coming out of subsidized education should be measured by. Those who achieve ‘A’s have succeed; those of lesser performance have failed in their responsibilities to the extent that they fall short of that mark, and should therefore *return* a proportion of their subsidy matching that degree of underperformance. To avoid favoritism and ‘compassionate’ padding of results, the results from formal State-wide tests run by the Educational authority would be the vehicle that would assess level of achievement for such purposes. Once the results of those tests have been determined, the student would get a report on their achievement and a bill for monies owed. Upon receipt students would immediately understand the nature of responsibility.
You'll be pleased then to hear that one of the leaders of the Quebec student protest movement was awarded the highest award for merit in the Province.
http://www.montrealgazette.com/news/Student+leader+wins+Lieutenant+Gover...
This protest, which is looking more and more like a revolution (especially since the passing of Bill78 effectively putting on pause freedom of expression in Quebec until July 2013) is remarkably not about self-entitlement. The students contend that before asking them to pump more of their own money into the education system, the State should ensure that it is managed properly. Campuses have been putting up new buildings like there is no tomorrow in the last few years and an enquiry into possible collusion between the Prime Minister's Liberal Party, the mob and the construction industry is about to start.
In short : this whole tuition fee hike stinks, Putting the whole thing on hold until at least after the inquiry would be a great idea. This is what a lot of the students are asking for. This sounds like good policing to me.
Good policing was to arrest 700 'revolutionists' in Quebec City and Montreal, and dish them out bills of £370 each. That may teach them what does financial responsibility mean.
A small price to pay to learn a priceless lesson : corrupt government don't last if you stand up for what's right.
Small price for spoiled kids who never earned any money except for clearing snow from neighbour's driveway, may be. And obviously not planning to work for their money in future, hanging on the state's teat till the early retirement.
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This is the highest goal of their 'revolution'.
I checked your link and it didn’t go anywhere. I also checked your referenced Newspaper, the Montreal Gazette, about the protests, and there was a lot of talk about ‘kettling,’ protestor and police violence, and opposition to the Bill 78 provisions and to higher tuition, but *nothing* about the crowd protesting political corruption. The Toronto Star newspaper had a similar collection of reported items, and again, *nothing* about the crowd protesting anything about corruption. The Montreal Gazette even had a story about the political corruption that you mentioned, but there was no tie-in to the student protests.
My survey was admittedly very limited, but I could find no evidence supporting your assertion that these protests are driven by a demand that ‘the State should ensure that [the educational system] is managed properly. The students are protesting against higher tuition and against the new constraints on protesting, nothing more. There were a number of factions mentioned, and maybe some are protesting corruption, but the majority are not.
Check Twitter under #LiberauxCorrompus and you'll find a whole lot of reading on the subject of why this particular government can't get its message across.
The absolute favourite chant on the streets is "Charest corrompu, on va te trouver une job dans le nord!" (Corrupt Charest, we'll find you a job up North - referencing the now infamous speech Charest gave about his Plan Nord while the most violent riots was going on right outside the venue, making it his Marie-Antoinette moment).
Interesting facts about this uprising:
1) we can get excellent coverage of anything happening in Haiti, Syria or Afghanistan but our own streets are too complicated to cover (No live coverage of the nightly marches)
2) Quebec remains a mystery to most Canadians - they love Harper (maybe that's why)
3) The "traditional" media (papers, TV) can't keep up with what is going on in the streets.
This whole mess would not have happened if another Prime Minister (i.e. not suspected of corruption) had suggested the hike. And it would not be what it is if the people in charge had accepted to at least sit down with the students for more than an hour after 12 weeks of "strike"!
It is a Liberal government-made mess on every level.
Just one point.
You state that “’traditional’ media (papers, TV) can't keep up with what is going on in the streets.” Yet these protests have been going on for over 100 days now. That implies that the purpose of these protests has shifted significantly from what it was when it began; shifted even beyond the protest against the restrictions on demonstrations put in place by Bill 78.
That is *has* shifted implies that, while the protests may have started out as protests against tuition, and later, against the Bill 78 provisions, that they have evolved even beyond that into a general protest against corruption. This is a radically different problem that goes beyond the immediate concerns of those initially involved. Such a shift in focus requires a concerted and organized effort and intent. That is, somebody is *using* these protests to achieve a political end. That is, somebody is *manipulating* these students to for their own purposes.
This is, of course, the ‘traditional’ methodology of professional agitators and insurrectionists. Something those students might want to keep in mind.
Hi I live in Montreal, and what you say does not surprise me. The press reports are blatantly false. For one thing there is no violence (or very little) from the demonstrators, on the other hand the police response against HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS of citizens has been very disturbing.
In the beginning of the movement, I was staunchly for the raise for the same reasons most people mention: government coffers are empty and the last thing I want is the government to take over completely control of higher learning.
But then law 78 was voted. And helicopters started hovering daily over my house. And 500 persons kettled in and charged criminally for demonstrating. And then I remembered Occupy Wall Street, the 2008 bank bailout, the 2 years+ the provincial government has been stalling inquiries into OBVIOUS corruption between organized crime and our elected politicians. And then I realized: government coffers are empty because our politicians are laughing all the way to the bank and screwing us royally.
The students are right. The raise is not the important thing, the important thing is that people are now communicating and networking outside of the usual trickle-down channels of mass media, and they are putting 2+2 together, and are asking their elected representatives TO WORK FOR THE PEOPLE, not for the banks.
Have a nice day.
This is just the most egregious example of a problem that probably affects most western liberal democracies but which I believe is especially bad in Canada; the large number, excessive cost and absolute uselessness of the bulk of university educations being obtained by today's youth. Huge numbers of kids are getting educations that qualify them for no employment whatsoever and these educations are heavily subsidized by general tax revenue. While I can't speak specifically about Quebec, many kids in my own province are in university while lacking virtually any academic talents whatsoever. It is a symptom of the excess of government jobs and the comfortable working conditions they provide. Sadly, it is the great goal of many in this country to get a job in government and just ride the low stress gravy train to retirement at 55. The untalented but educated class now see this as their birthright in this country. And Quebec is the Greece of Canada. Deficit ridden, corrupt and adamantly Socialist ( as long as Canada keeps paying for it).
Spare us your petty racism and half-truths. Canada is NOT paying for Quebec "socialism". Transfer payments amount to about one percent of Quebec's GDP, and on a per-capita basis are FAR lower than what is dished out to the Atlantic provinces and Manitoba. The fact of the matter is that Quebeckers are paying for our "socialism" through our taxes.
And comparisons with Greece are ridiculous. Quebec has no trouble financing its deficit through bond markets due to the quality of its assets (such as North America's largest utility) and proven tax-raising capabilities.
Finally, spare us your petty anti-university prejudices. You have no idea what constitutes a "valuable" degree.
Perfect example of what happens when a group of citizens who have never done an honest days work their entire life and have lived on societies largeness is asked to pay for some of their services
The irony is that Quebec has one of the lowest University tuition fees in the whole country! How insatiably 'entitled' some are!!
I have always felt that Quebec style of government is very much modeled after Germany in the 1930s, with out the genocide.
There is a preferred ethnic group that the government makes laws to protect (French language laws). It segregates schools based on parents genealogy. Much of the dialogue involves scapegoats (English Canada) and racism - a 2007 Leger Poll (google Leger Poll Racism in Quebec) found a majority of Quebecers have racist feelings towards minorities and proportionally more racists in Quebec..
"Nearly half of Canadians outside Quebec - 47 per cent - answered they were either slightly, moderately or extremely racist. But among Quebecers, that proportion was significantly higher - 59 per cent."
The state is very involved in corporate Quebec. The government is corrupt.
Other than the genocide Quebec runs on the 1930's German model.
The only thing this poll proves is that Quebeckers are more honest than others.
I have travelled extensively in Canada and believe me, there is racism everywhere.
A better test would be to ask ethnic minorities what they think. I often do that, and it turns out that those living in Quebec (Montreal) generally love the place.
The Quebec government is viewed by a great majority of the population as arrogant, corrupt and pseudo-reforming (they have talked about reforms for years but essentially done nothing). They would dearly like to hold an election on the issue of the tuition increase (covering college and university but not the tuition-free junior college level) - it is the only way for it to win re-election. So all their actions are designed to prolong the crisis until autumn when they can call an election.
My daughter is one of the students caught up in the effects of these protests. She was effectively locked out of class for 8 weeks and now has to undergo a month from Hell to complete her term. The student groups are protesting on a principle of right to education, but have denied that right to students who would have chosen to attend classes rather than demonstrate.
While I would be one of the last people to support a law that would curtail a citizen's right to free speech and peaceful protest, it should be noted that the student organizations invited the strong government reaction but refusing to categorically denounce violent protest.
Lastly, with regards to the tuition increases in question. Quebec has traditionally had amongst the lowest tuition rates in Canada due to student activism on the subject. In fact, if you were to adjust 1968 tuition rates for annual inflation rates, the proposed 2017 tuition rates would be almost equal to those inflation adjusted rates, and Quebec rates would still be below the national average.
These tuition protests are simply a childish temper tantrum by a generation that feels entitled to whatever it demands.
Quebec has the second lowest per capita enrollment for Post Secondary in Canada with the lowest tuition.
Nova Scotia has the higest tuition and the highest enrollment.
The amazing correlation is that if you look at the minimum wage in each province. In 2002 - the data I have available - BC and QUE had the highest minimum wages and the lowest university enrollment. NS and AB had the lowest minimum wage and the 1st and 3rd highest enrollment.
While these facts are intriguing, is there evidence proving a direct cause and effect correlation?
In the same vein, I propose that part of the problem in Quebec may be the CEGEP (community college) system itself. Unlike in the rest of Canada, high school graduates in Quebec are not generally considered to be finished their education until they have also completed a CEGEP program. They have the option of completing a 2 year university prep program (only a very small percentage of the highest achieving high school graduates will be accepted directly into university) or a three year skills-based workforce prep program. I suspect that a significant percentage of high school graduates are opting for the much cheaper 3 years and a good job opportunity over 5 to 6 years and an expensive degree that no longer guarantees anything but a chance at a job interview for a position that requires the degree to even apply. In tough times, actual skills trump theoretical training.
Quebec has the second lowest per capita enrollment for Post Secondary in Canada with the lowest tuition.
When you underprice a good, it is not valued as much as it should.
I'm in favour of the fee increase, but please read baguinaga's comment.
CEGEPs are great for those who would waste time in university but still wish to obtain proper education for their career. It is churning out professionals in all fields, which is good for society. Hence, at least I posit, the lower university enrolments.
Thank you for the informative article. I plan to attend a conference in Montreal (at the University in the first week in June) and I hope that it will not be canceled, due to disorders.
By the way, how are tuition increases justified by administration? Who should pay for the costs of education?
Ludwik Kowalski (see Wikipedia)
http://csam.montclair.edu/~kowalski/life/intro.html
The Economist is mistaken on one thing, the 300 arrests came *after* the stricter laws, the protests were in response to bill 78. I hope The Economist can correct that mistake to give a more accurate picture.
Its only a little money until it comes out of your pocket.
I found this video of hooligans disrupting a restaurant. The security camera footage starts at :30.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GGGVPZN9Jjw
Some people just have no respect for public order.
hahaha love it.
I must say that viewed from within the eye of the storm, most of the violence indeed seems to be stemming from the police force. The nightly protest are anything but violent until the police shows up and starts beating people.
This is what a typical march looks like : http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=hK3ZFYj0dzE
And let's remind everyone that none of this if the government would only talk with student leaders. Time for an election.
You say "The nightly protest are anything but violent until the police shows up and starts beating people."
.
This is a blatant lie.
Are you there? Since you have the British pound on your keyboard, I would be surprised to discover you are a Montreal resident. Do you perhaps know Mblandry is lying because you heard someone say so on the television?
I don't consume television since I came of age several decades ago. But I still believe my own eyes, not Mblandry's opinion. Though he's entitled to it, of course. You know, opinions are like assholes, everybody has one.
Well I am right-leaning politically, and live smack in the middle of montreal. I neither watch TV, but I can tell you Shubrook is right.
The government is trying to bank on the issue, because frankly it has no leg to stand on after promising to degrease the public sector it actually doubled its size. So they expect (encourage) violence from the students, to justify harsh countermeasures.
Quebec has a long history of fiscal mismanagement that has led to this situation. As shown in this article, despite austerity measures being imposed by the Charest government, Quebec will still have the highest debt-to-GDP ratio among all provinces:
http://viableopposition.blogspot.ca/2012/05/quebecs-fiscal-situation-nec...
FREE QUEBEC
From who? The mob?
$1,600/year extra at the end of 5 years.
Why, that's more than the cost of one latte per day!
NPWFTL
Regards
Quebec looks like a distinct society especially when you think about how things evolve in the rest of Canada. I don't know if this is due to some cultural proximity with France but they look like expecting much more from state as in Europe. If they follow on this path I won't be surprised if the sovereignty debate shows up again.
Quebec would suffer hyper-inflation if they separated from Canada, lost the transfer payments that see them get $1.50 for every $1.00 contributed to Confederation.
I have been pro kicking Quebec out of Canada for years. Remove their right to use the loonie, remove the passports, as Bill Clinton once stated, if Quebec left Canada the USA would not consider it part of NATO or NAFTA.
During the hyperinflation, intelligent Western Canadian businessmen , such as myself would scoop up all the cheap assets and reverse the Quiet Revolution.
I hope the sovereignty question returns.
Why do you have so much hate for a population that mostly wouldn't want anything bad to happen to you? So much projection, you would think readers of this usually intelligent newspaper would go above the level you use. And you obviously have no knowledge of international laws.
I have no hate for French Canadians. My mother comes from a French Canadian family from south Saskatchewan. A group of Canadian French that is looked down on by other French Canadians.
If the next Quebec election brings in a PQ govt who wants seperatism, I would be fine with kicking Quebec out as premptive. But a sovereign nation of Quebec should be proud enough to use currency with out the Queen, god bless her, on it.
What do you think a Qubec dollar would be worth? 20 cents on the loonie?
What facts are you basing your currency forecast on? Quebec is resources rich, and oil was even discovered under the st-lawrence river. We have high tech industries, and some of the world's most highly regarded engineering and aerospace firms. Although I have to admit I am not quite old enough to have witnessed a developped country split peacefully from another, I tend to find your analysis highly biased and based on no other facts than your own racism.
point 2: on a per capita basis, the only province receiving less transfers than Quebec in Ontario. The idea that the province is living off your money is a complete mistatement.
point 3: you realize a currency is a good that can be freely bought on the markets right? If quebec wants to keep CAD as their currency, Canada does not have a single word to say about it. Hell, if Somalia wants to use the loonie as their currency Canada does not have a word to say about it.
Racism? Québécois are predominatly Caucasian. French is not a race.
Alberta receives less on a per capita basis, as does Manitoba, show your stats to prove me wrong. All "have provinces", BC,AB,SK pay more into federation than they receive. I think you need to do some research.
And Canada does have a say in who uses their currency. When Iceland recently proposed it, Canada said it was open to discussions on facilitating that for Iceland.
Quebec would not be part of NAFTA meaning the good sor sale would be suffer tariffs. Head offices have been fleeing Montreal, there would be nothing left.
The west has never had it as good as Quebec.
What would .quebec use to buy currency on the market? Quebec dollars? If so, drastically devalued dollars
By the way I am half French Canadian....
Here is why Quebec would suffer hyper inflation. Quebec and Ontario receive the largest transfer payments from the Federal govt. More than they pay in taxes. You can only receive a transfer payment of the equalization program determines you deserve more than what you paid in. Saskatchewan last year got 0 in transfer payments due to its strong economy.
From Wikipedia
Transfer payments are a collection of fiscal equalization processes used in Canada. Chief among these are the Canada Social Transfer, the Canada Health Transfer and equalization payments. The last of these can be spent however the receiving provinces see fit, while the first two must be spent on social and health services respectively.
The Canadian federal government budgeted in 2009-10 nearly $60 billion to transfer to the provinces and territories through major transfers (Canada Health Transfer, Canada Social Transfer, Equalization and Territorial Formula Financing), direct targeted support and trust funds – an increase of $6.7 billion from the previous year
Approximately 70% of the 10 million Canadians residing in "have not" provinces are in Quebec.
Quebec and Ontario will receive the most from equalization payments in the 2012-2013 year.[3]
However, per capita, PEI benefits the most. In the 2012-2013 year, the following provinces will receive equalization payments:[3]
Quebec ($7.391 billion)
Ontario ($3.261 billion)
Manitoba ($1.671 billion)
New Brunswick ($1.495 billion)
Nova Scotia ($1.268 billion)
Prince Edward Island ($337 million)
The following provinces will not qualify for equalization payments in 2012-2013:
Alberta
Saskatchewan
Newfoundland and Labrador
British Columbia
Please explain to me how Quebec gets the least from Canada? I think you need to question the propaganda you have been indoctrinated with.
By these figures Quebec was transferred $7billion approximately, has a population of 7 million approximately. The west, BC AB SK and MB have an approximate population of 9 million and got $1.6 billion. Please explain to me again the hardship on Quebec and how it's finances would not collapse creating hyperinflation?
When you add the figures up Quebec got transfer payments equal to the rest of Canada. Add on the fact Quebec has the 2nd largest provincial debt and it is denominated in Canadian dollars, not the devalued Quebec Libres.
Quebecs hydro bill would skyrocket when Labrador stopped letting it steal from Churchill Falls.
The public education system in Quebec must teach propaganda.
By the way that french Canadian in me is originally Trois Rivière but more recently South west Saskatchewan French. We are of the Allerie family and moved to north America in the 1600s. But left Quebec in the 1800s.
I bet you look down on Saskatchewan French.
If you look at the per capita total allocation, you can see that Quebec is not much higher than the national average. http://www.fin.gc.ca/fedprov/mtp-eng.asp#Quebec
This is also balanced by the fact that Quebec manages more social programs itself than other provinces (say immigration programs for example), which explains in good part why we get a bigger part of what we pay to Ottawa back than other provinces. Also, the duplication of the tax services between Quebec and Ottawa costs close to 2bn dollars to quebecois every year (source: Jean-Martin Aussant, an economist).
As for the currency you said it yourself, canada offered to ''facilitate'', not permit it. There are approximately 15 countries using the us dollar as their official currency, and several others where the currency is widely used although it is not the official currency (just google it). Even if Quebec had its own currency, it can easily be pegged to another by competent central bank management, just as China has been doing for decades.
I am not worried about NAFTA at all. We are not in the 90s anymore, and in a globalized world just about every country has a trade agreement with several other countries/regions (just look at the pacific trade agreement, there are several ''poor'' countries involved in it). This argument might have been relevant in 1995, but no longer in 2012.
I do not look down on any french or english speaking canadian, and I have friends in several other provinces. I just cannot stand people who look down at Quebec claiming we are living off Alberta's oil (which is by the way ruining most of the west's water)like beggars. If you are not happy with us, you guys should hold a nation wide referendum and we'll be more than happy to get out and stop hearing about Harper's airplanes, prisons and abortions.
Lol It is laughable to see Albertans, who suddenly sit on a ton of oil, congratulate themselves as being good businessmen and scowl other provinces which do not have the luxury of having their provincial taxes paid for by the oil companies (and if you believe it is a FREE lunch...). You guys go ahead and separate, we will be watching from the side how long it takes for you to be a free society like in Venezuela, Saudi Arabia etc...
You cannot remove the right to use the loonie anymore than you can remove Quebec from NAFTA. That would be vehemently opposed by business groups in both the US and Canada.
You are a fool really. Why even bother answering...
NAFTA is a legal document between Canada, USA and Mexico. If Quebec were to part from Canada it would not be part of the three legal entities covered in NAFTA. That is why Bill Clinton stated in 1995 that an independent Quebec would not immediately be accepted in NAFTA by the USA.
It would not be removing the right to use the loonie, but why would an independent Quebec want to submit to Canadian monetary policy that is set in Ottawa? Quebec would have to purchase CAD on the currency markets, and how would it do that? Quebec would have to set up its own central bank. What would they print? Not CAD.
To quote Duceppe on free trade with America after separatism:
"Duceppe’s notion that Quebec could easily enter into a free-trade agreement with the United States post separation."
"“In Washington, trade they say is a four-letter word, not a five-letter word, it’s so politically sensitive,” Short said.
“I would respectfully suggest that it’s going to be more complicated in the hypothetical situation of a sovereign Quebec and you have to decide what’s going to happen to NAFTA . . . it’s going to be a very nasty, ugly, protracted discussion.”"
Why would he say that? Because he was discussing the ramifications of being kicked out of NAFTA.
You should learn some history and some law before you call someone a fool, because you look silly now.
Sorry, you are still a fool for thinking that Quebec could not use the loonie. Now you are retracting by saying we COULD use it, but it wouldn't be in our interest. That's beside the point - I was just referring to the right to use it, and to your overblown sense of power over our destiny.
As for NAFTA, I don't dispute the fact that it would have to be re-negotiated. But you seem to assume that independence would be the end of free trade for Quebec. That's ridiculous. We North Americans are pragmatic, enterprising people. Quebec trades billions with the rest of the continent, most notably with Ontario, New York State and New England. That's not going to end. Quebec's economy DWARFS Alberta's.
Besides, you are referring to discussions that occurred 15 years ago. We are far from moving toward another referendum, but when we do I'm sure these issues will be addressed. We have a lot of friends in the US.
My guess is that you are just a bitter Western Canadian who is frustrated that all of his oil dollars can't buy respect in the rest of Canada, let alone the rest of the world.
"According to the Globe and Mail tiny Iceland, "is looking longingly to the loonie as the salvation from wild economic gyrations and suffocating capital controls...And for the first time, the Canadian government says it’s open to discussing idea."
Any country can use another countries currency, Ecuador uses the USD. Countries do this because they lack credibility, however the foreign nation enters a currency agreement, hence Iceland discussing whether the BOC would facilitate this. If the BOC did not it would be inefficient.
I am a French Canadian from Saskatchewan who grew up in BC. You sound like a bitter French Canadian who believes he in entitled to whatever he wants and the rest of the country should care.
By the way Quebec GDP Is 18% of Canada's GDP and Albetra is 16%. I would not call that dwarfing. On top of that AB has half the people. AB, SK and MB represent 23% of GDP and all three provinces are growing whole Quebec is contracting.
Don't be upset you were born 200 years too late.
Is the author of this article lived in Quebec? His view is unfaithful, bias and lack major informations. Feel like government of Quebec propaganda. He refered to 'a poll' done on 800 persons (non-probabilistic sample) before the text of the law 78 was even known. Recent polls done by Léger Marketing shows a different story. Clearly, both governement and students associations are responsible for such a mess. Until the problem get resolved, seeing police brutality each night is your only reason to do tourism in Quebec.
All kinds of polls by media and professional polling firms show a majority supporting the government.
Further to that, here is a link to an article written today by one of Quebecs most respected journalists. Ms. Gagnon is usually considered a centre-left commentator, but she makes some surprising comments regarding the base of support for the protestors. I find especially interesting her (unsourced) assertion that two-thirds of Quebec students opposed the boycott.
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/politics/lysiane-gagnon/the-tuition-...
Ms. Gagnon like other journalist of 'La Presse' (like Andre Pratte) has from the start adopt a word for word verbatim of what the governement has said. Here the recent poll : http://www.journaldemontreal.com/2012/05/21/le-gouvernement-va-trop-loin
A huge protest will be organised and the 'Commission hearings into allegations of corruption in Quebec’s construction industry' will start today. I hope The Economist will talk more about it, corruption is the main reason why the population neither trust the governement of Quebec, and the mayor of Montreal.
While I have little doubt that the majority of Quebecois are not sympathetic to the protestors; I do not consider Ms. Gagnon to be centre-left at all; or any more credible than your average media pundit. (ie Not very)
Her unsourced claim is just as baseless as anything some newspaper or tv personality might say without attribution.
The poll to which you link shows that a majority of Quebecers oppose the new emergency laws. But it also shows that a consistent majority of Quebecers have supported the tuition increases all through this affair.
Come on! Ms Gagnon is a right-wing commentator. Only in the United States would she be considered centre-left (like Obama!). And remember when you read her that she is paid by the same people who finance the Liberal Party (they happen to own La Presse)...
Quebec has the second lowest enrollment in Post Secondary in Canada with the lowest tuition. It seems most young Quebecers do not care about going to university. This is a temper tantrum by spoiled children.
Quebec receives $1.50 from Ottawa for every $1.00 the province pays in. The province steals electricity from NFLD, a poorer region.
Quebec always seems to have the "victim" attitude. That is why the province is so corrupt.