By Kim McConnell
February 7, 2010
The Liberals, creator of the most divisive policy in Canada, think that they can use the appointment of Bob Runciman, one of the five new senators, to give the Conservatives a black-eye.
Trudeau, and his many social engineering programs, thought that the open-hearted and open-minded Canadians would support a policy that he sold as a “unity” measure that would 
bring French Quebec into the fold of the Canadian family. He put in the guidelines of “where numbers warrant” and he said, “no English-speaker will lose his/her job” on the basis of this policy.
English-speaking Canadians believed him and the Liberal Party was given free rein with the implementation of this policy, putting in place senior public servants like Lucienne Robillard, principally from Quebec, to set the policy in motion.
Slowly but surely, unilingual English-speakers were faced with an impenetrable glass ceiling unless they could master the convoluted French language and pass the French language tests that even French-speakers found difficult to pass.
Now more than 40 years after this disastrous policy was put in place, we have a Conservative government. Will this government take a look at this policy that has been shown to discriminate against the unilingual English-speaker?
Does this government understand that this policy has NOT brought about the elusive “unity” of the country which is decidedly more divided than it was 45 years ago?
Does this government know how expensive this policy is as the demands of the minority French-speakers (3% outside Quebec) for French-only institutions increase because bilingual institutions were not good enough?
| According to a report released in May 2009 by the Fraser Institute, “… Canada’s federal government and other bodies subject to the Official Languages Act spend up to $1.8 billion annually providing French-language services.” |
We see signs that this government is starting to see the light and we look upon the appointment of Senator Bob Runciman as proof that Harper is not averse to having someone in a position of influence who was one of the few initial critics of the Official Languages Act.
The Liberals did us a great favour by high-lighting Bob Runciman’s attempts to point out that this policy in NOT a good policy because it will work against the interests of the majority English-speakers and he’s right. We bear witness to that fact.
Just a note of clarification; the Alliance for the Preservation of English in Canada (APEC) did not organize that flag-stomping episode – this was proven to be done by English-speaking Quebecers who were so disgusted with the Quebec anti-English laws that they showed it in the only way they could as they had been abandoned by their own government of Quebec and the Liberal government at the Federal level. -- Kim
****
The Liberal Party, in a post entitled; In their own words: Harper’s newest Senator attacks bilingualism, had this to say about Bob Runciman:
Stephen Harper’s newest Senator, Bob Runciman, has some strong views opposing bilingualism and French-language services, including support for the Alliance for the Preservation of English in Canada (APEC), a notorious anti-French organization that once trampled on and burned a Québec flag.
Runciman’s support for APEC’s campaign against the Canadian government’s policy of official bilingualism:
“Leeds MPP Bob Runciman wrote [APEC] a supportive letter last month ... Runciman will be the English preservation group's guest speaker at its April 27 monthly meeting, according to Garner.” (Kingston Whig-Standard, April 11, 1987)
“It is ‘extremely important’ that the various groups opposed to French-language services ‘pull together,’ said Ontario Progressive Conservative MPP Robert Runciman.” (The Ottawa Citizen, November 6, 1989)
APEC’s tactics:
“APEC is best known in Quebec for television footage of some of its members trampling on a Quebec flag in Brockville, Ont., last summer.” (Toronto Star, November 21, 1990)
“Some members of the Association for the Preservation of English in Canada trampled on the Quebec flag.” (Toronto Star, June 20, 1991)
“On a platform behind the train station, a Quebec flag was spread out. About half a dozen demonstrators took turns stomping and spitting on the Fleur-de-lis before it was set ablaze.” (Ottawa Citizen, October 19, 1992)
Runciman worked with APEC in opposition to French immersion education:
“The Brockville chapter of APEC successfully opposed a petition to introduce French immersion classes in the Leeds and Grenville school district; not that the school board really needed prodding from APEC to turn down French immersion. Bob Runciman, the local MPP, supports APEC and has addressed a meeting of its Brockville chapter.” (Kingston Whig-Standard, July 11 1987)
Runciman helped whip up anti-bilingualism sentiment:
“Runciman has apparently helped whip up the anti-bilingualism sentiment in the area, and [APEC] members claimed 1,400 people have joined the cause in Brockville and 10,000 across the province.” (The Toronto Star, Aug 16 1987)
Runciman on federal bilingualism:
A “supreme exercise in social engineering...Pierre Trudeau's social revolution, whose central, inescapable fact is loss of power for unilingual Canadians.” (Bob Runciman, Ontario Hansard, May 21, 1986)
“There are feelings there underneath the surface. There's a lot of lingering resentment over federal bilingualism.” (Bob Runciman, Windsor Star, July 24, 1987)
Runciman opposed French-language services in Ontario:
“‘The way Peterson has been introducing and applying French services is going beyond the intent of most members (who voted in favor of the bill),’ Runciman said. He cited French telephone books and Queen's Park publications as examples of unnecessary measures.” (The Kingston Whig-Standard, Aug 15 1987)
“[Runciman] stands to the right of his Tory colleagues in the degree he thinks bilingual services are needed in Ontario.” (Kingston Whig-Standard, Sep 16 1989)
“Progressive Conservative MPP Robert Runciman today called on Consumer and Commercial Relations Minister Monte Kwinter and LCBO Chairman Jack Ackroyd to explain why the Board intends to hire only 'bilingual' applicants for new jobs at its stores in Cornwall and Ottawa... to require all new employees to speak both languages is preposterous.” (Bob Runciman Press Release, December 16, 1986)
Runciman advocated the shut-down of Ontario’s French-language public broadcaster:
“It's costing us, as taxpayers, something like $35 million a year for the operation of La Chaîne...Why do they need that symbolic gesture out there which is costing millions and millions of taxpayers' dollars and accomplishing virtually nothing?” (Bob Runciman, October 28, 1993)
“They are attempting to appeal to something like 185,000 Franco-Ontarians. That is their audience. ...What we are doing is spending significant sums of taxpayers' money on a network which is really not fulfilling any meaningful need within the province.” (Bob Runciman, Ontario Hansard, October 30, 1991)
Kim continues her campaign with:
I’m circulating two letters written by two very prolific letter-writers from our support base and our hope is that more people will write in to congratulate Senator Bob Runciman.
You can email him at: info@bobruncimanmpp.com and if that doesn’t work, you can send him a letter.
Send mail postage-free to any Senator at the following address:
The Senate of Canada,
Ottawa, Ontario
Canada
K1A 0A4
From: John Wood
To: Michael Ignatieff; info@liberal.ca
Cc: Prime Minister Harper ; Brian Storseth
Sent: Wednesday, February 03, 2010 3:17 PM
Subject: Re. In their own words;Tit for Tat
Dear Mr. Ignatieff, et al,
Your attack on newly appointed Senator Bob Runciman is pure political partisanship. Anyone can hire researchers to dig up comments and statements made by politicians, etc. It is stupid and a waste of the money you solicit from even more stupid party supporters.
Your Liberal party leaders (PMs) hold the record for appointing party faithfuls to the Senate. How do you think a Liberal majority was attained in the Senate and maintained for so many decades? It's the nature of the 'game' that political parties play in Canada! The Senate is nothing but a corrupt retirement home for party hacks, all parties.
As for the anti-bilingual comments by Runciman, it is refreshing to hear from someone with a little common sense on the subject, instead of the same old Liberal racism about minority French rights and national unity.
There is very little 'democracy' in Canada! I will simply refer you to any English language dictionary for the definition of the word. The fact is, Official Bilingualism is the most offensive, divisive, expensive boondoggle in the history of Canada.
Here are a few recorded comments by Liberal notables:
"Unilingual Anglophones will be subjected to a lifetime of job immobility" -- P.E.Trudeau.
"The Canadian community must invest, for the defense and better appreciation of the French language, as much time, energy and money as are required to keep the country from breaking up." -- P.E.Trudeau, PM.
"Given these facts, should French speaking people concentrate their efforts on Quebec, or take the whole of Canada as their base? In my opinion, they should do both; and for the purpose, they could find no better instrument than Federalism." -- P.E.Trudeau, PM.
"Canada is going to be a French speaking nation, coast to coast and anybody opposed to this is opposed to the best interests of Canada." -- Leo Cadieux.
"There is no way two ethnic groups in one country can be made equal before the law.....and to say it is possible is to sow the seeds of destruction." -- P.E.Trudeau, 1965.
"I cannot swear it, but I think we were thinking to ourselves,.......we were a small group, Trudeau, Pelletier, Marchand, Lalonde, Chretien, myself and a few people in the civil services, say 50 all told,......we were bringing off a revolution. We held the key posts. We were making the civil service bilingual, kicking and screaming all the time." -- Jean Luc Pepin.
Stop me if these are not Liberals.
"Quebec can make French the only official language in spite of the Constitution." -- P.E.Trudeau.
"The Government of Canada has no right to promote English in Quebec." -- Gil Remillard (Minister for Inter-Governmental Affairs, 1988).
"Bilingualism is unthinkable for Quebec." --Robert Bourassa.
"Why do that (separate) when I can give you all of Canada?" -- P.E.Trudeau (in a speech to the Separatists).
"We (Quebecois?) are never entirely satisfied and we want to promote bilingualism even more then we do now." --Lucienne Robillard, President of the Treasury Board, 2001.
This has been only a few of the hundreds of similar anti-English Canadian comments and statements made by some of your more prominent Liberal colleagues.
"People who live in glass houses shouldn't throw stones." "What's good for the goose is good for the gander."
Call Me Canadian!
John M. Wood
From: Elizabeth Trudeau
Sent: February 2, 2010 8:44 PM
To: info@bobruncimanmpp.com
Cc: pm@pm.gc.ca; reids@parl.gc.ca; Pierre Lemieux; info@guylauzon.ca; Poilievre.P@parl.gc.ca;
Subject: Congratulations on becoming senator
Dear Mr. Runciman,
I wished to congratulate you on becoming a senator. It gives myself and a great many other people that I know, comfort in knowing there is someone in the "house of sober second thought", that MIGHT, MAYBE, find the guts to stand up for the majority of Canadians, which are English speaking Canadians, the most discriminated against group in the federal government because of the language they speak.
I DO know you have spoken out over the years, but sadly find your quotes against official bilingualism seem to end in the 1990's. I am hoping that the attached letters will convince you to become the champion for the English majority again, a champion that elected MP's cannot be as they are afraid to lose votes.
I am the official spokesperson for the Canadians for Language Fairness, which used to be APEC. I live in Russell Township where our Mayor Ken Hill forced through a VERY unpopular bilingual sign bylaw, and I work closely with both Howard Galganov and Jean Serge Brisson, who have both challenged this law on the grounds of freedom of expression under our Charter of Rights and Freedoms.
I have included several articles that I have written about both the Canada Post issue as well as on Upper Canada Village and the erosion of the British Loyalist Upper Canada Village. Promised by the government of the time, to be a living memorial to the families of the Lost Villages, located in Stormont, Dundas, Glengarry, who had to leave their homesteads so the St Lawrence could be flooded for a Hydro energy project.
I sincerely hope you can find the time to enlighten yourself on what is happening in Eastern Ontario, to the East of Ottawa and I would be more than willing to discuss this further at your convenience.
Sincerely,
Beth Trudeau
Official Spokesperson for the Canadians for Language Fairness
Embrun, Ontario
613-443-2370
iloveblue.beth@gmail.com
Beth Trudeau can be contacted for any of the articles mentioned in her letter.
Cogeco TV has posted the interview that was done on the Pakenham Post Office issue.
http://www.tvcogeco.com/renfrew/gallerie/tvcogeco-news/1765-tvcnews-january/13693-bilingual-policies
Oh, by the way, Giles Duceppe still thinks that Quebec has been short-changed:
http://www.ottawasun.com/news/canada/2010/02/03/12729151-qmi.html
Ottawa Sun Feb 3, 2010
Duceppe: Quebec still being overlooked
By QMI Agency
OTTAWA — Quebec is getting a progressively worse deal within Canada when it comes to the environment and the economy, Bloc Quebecois Leader Gilles Duceppe says.
Speaking to students at the University of Ottawa, home to the first Bloc Quebecois campus club outside Quebec, Duceppe said 20 years after the failure of the Meech Lake constitutional accord, Quebec is not only no closer to a constitutional offer that meets Quebec’s needs, its needs in other areas — from the economy and the environment to language, culture and education — are being ignored.
“It is clear that in Canada there is no political will to respond to Quebec’s aspirations.”
For Quebec to prosper, it should focus on three pillars — education, research and culture, he said. For example, the Bloc would like to see a fiscal incentive of $8,000 over three years to encourage graduates to move to the regions.
However, Duceppe said the federal government has interfered with Quebec’s jurisdiction on student bursaries, cut financing of research and failed to stand up for the French Language Charter, Bill 101.
Duceppe said the Bloc will continue to work to increase Quebec’s room to maneuver within Canada. However, he is convinced Quebecers will eventually realize they can’t reform federalism and they will support Quebec sovereignty.
— QMI Agency
See what I mean? They can never be satisfied so why are we bending over backwards trying? LET THEM GO!!! --Kim
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