Liberals won't debate Québécois nationhood at convention

Last Updated: Tuesday, November 28, 2006 | 2:42 PM ET

CBC News

A day after the House of Commons passed a Conservative motion to recognize the Québécois as a nation, the federal Liberals say they will not debate the contentious issue.

Liberal leadership candidates had been squabbling over their own motion, which was expected to be a flashpoint at this weekend's party convention in Montreal.

William Hogg and Marc Belanger, who launched the move to discuss the Québécois nationhood motion at a meeting of Quebec Liberals in October, said the motion removed the need to discuss the issue.

"We have other important issues facing this country to discuss," Hogg said Tuesday, citing Canada's military mission in Afghanistan, the Kyoto Protocol and the country's fiscal imbalance as priorities for the convention.

Hogg also refused to enter the debate over the definition of "Québécois" and who belongs in the nation, saying they are for the Conservatives to clarify.  

The motion, which stated, "That this House recognize that the Québécois form a nation within a united Canada," passed Monday night in Parliament by a 266-16 margin.

Fifteen Liberal MPs voted against the motion, including Liberal leadership candidates Ken Dryden and Joe Volpe, along with Independent MP Garth Turner.

Before Monday's vote, Liberal leadership candidate Gerard Kennedy, a former Ontario legislature minister, decried the motion for its ambiguity, saying it treated Canada "like a political trinket."

Kennedy broke with his main leadership rivals, who have supported the motion — albeit with varying degrees of enthusiasm.

Michael Ignatieff, considered the race's front-runner, embraced the idea of a Quebec nation within Canada even before the motion was introduced.

Bob Rae and Stéphane Dion are on record as supporting the motion, but have said they do not consider it a priority.

When asked about the issue on Tuesday, Rae said he didn't want to get bogged down in endless debate over its meaning.

"I didn't get us into this; I'm not going to go into that swamp," Rae said, citing the frustration he and others felt in previous attempts to resolve Quebec's constitutional status within Canada at Meech Lake and Charlottetown.

"I think there are a lot of other ways of demonstrating our respect for the special character of Quebec."

Dryden, who is not considered one of the four leading candidates, dismissed the motion as "pure politics."

The Liberal convention in Montreal will culminate in the election of a new leader on Saturday.