LEO GERVAIS
Hot on the heels of Parti Québécois Finance Minister Bernard Landry's so-called 'Houdini' budget, the PQ has done it again. Last week, Municipal Affairs Minister Louise Harel released her long-awaited 'white paper', the blueprint for municipal reform in La Belle Province.
Why does Quebec need municipal reform? There are many reasons, including the fact that 1306 of the 2500 or so towns in Canada are in the mostly-French province.
This makes the dealings of the PQ government with more than different 1000 mayors very, well, bureaucratic. To cut the red tape, the PQ has decided to downsize. How much downsizing will occur will only be known in September when various committees studying the possibility of merging services and activities of several major areas like Montreal and Quebec City will recommend to the PQ which, if any, cities and towns should merge.
Ah, but trouble brews in paradise, on several beachfronts.
In the hinterland of Quebec, where the PQ garners most of its support, there are many little fiefdoms of 500 citizens or less, each with its own mayor, councillors, etc. In fact, the following numbers tell the real story: There are 552 Quebec towns or cities with less than 1000 people, but only 49 communities with more than 25,000.
Obviously, many of these towns grew around the former anchor that kept most Quebec communities together — the local Roman Catholic church. Today, in an age when the church is looked upon as a former boss who no longer wields much influence, many of these towns are probably better off merging for a variety of reasons, including more services for the tax dollar as the small tax bases cannot pay for the quality and scope of services most people expect, especially after the almost billion dollar downloading of expenses from the PQ to municipalities in recent yesars.
The trouble lies in the fact that the afore-mentioned mayors are mostly unwilling to give up their turf.
And they can use the threat of asking their constituents not to vote for the PQ next time around in about three years as a big stick to say "Back off!"
Another front has somewhat more serious implications for anglophones (English-speaking people) in Quebec, especially Montreal.
If any of the 14 legally bilingual towns or cities in the 29-member Montreal Urban Community (MUC) were to merge with Montreal, they would lose their bilingual status, a status conferred only to municipalities with more than half of its residents English.
The City of Westmount, for example, has 20,000 residents, and roughly 80 per cent of them declare English as their mother tongue, according to Statistics Canada's 1996 census.
If Westmount, which is currently geographically surrounded by the City of Montreal, is forced to merge, it would lose its bilingual status because Montreal has about one million residents -- approximately 70 per cent of them
French-speaking.
This language-tinged problem will certainly be a point of contention for the fourteen MUC members who will be affected, and some observers say it could be enough to challenge the PQ all the way to the Supreme Court.
Is the possibility of mergers a way to eliminate some red tape in a bloated conglomeration of towns, townships and cities? Definitely.
Is it a way to drive one more stake into the English heart of Montreal? Probably.
When it comes to the PQ, never doubt their mission: to create and govern a separate Quebec state that will operate in French. Any and all means to achieve this goal are applauded and encouraged, including mergers.
Sticking it to English Montrealers that 'rotten' bunch who helped the separatists lose the last referendum by a chintzy 80,000 votes is simply a bonus. Leo Gervais publishes and edits the Montreal weekly newspaper, The Westmount Examiner.
Copyright © 2000 Leo Gervais/Log Cabin Chronicles/5.2000 |
