Echoes

ik - I defer yet again to Mr. Wells' more learned coverage of this developing issue ...

From Hansard, Feb. 17, 1998

Mr. Denis Coderre (Bourassa, Lib.): Mr. Speaker, a number of separatists switch sides over the years. They call that progressing, except that in certain instances, there is a certain lack of subtlety.

For example, a former minister in the Conservative government of Brian Mulroney and a friend of the current Conservative leader, Monique Vézina, yesterday said she never had been a federalist. So what was she doing in the Conservative government? What was she doing in a party that was promising to bring Quebec back into the constitutional fold with honour, as former Prime Minister Brian Mulroney put it? Was Ms. Vézina a separatist while she was representing the Conservative government as part of her duties abroad?

That is the essence of the separatist coalition, which comprises individuals who will try to obliterate their past to make way for their proposal to separate Quebec from the rest of Canada.

If that is democracy, I far prefer commitments by people who speak frankly, coherently, with their past—

The Speaker: The hon. member for Sherbrooke.

>> Send your comments to Paul Wells. Posted by Paul Wells at 10:29 AM 08/16/2005