Maxime Bernier, who is fast earning himself a reputation as a slaughterer of sacred cows, is now taking a stab at a big one: Quebec's landmark language law, Bill 101.
The former federal cabinet minister told a Halifax radio station on Friday that he doesn't see the need for the historic legislation that is the pillar of Quebec's French language charter.
The remarks could hold national implications. They spread like wildfire over the Internet late Friday in Quebec, where the Conservative government holds 11 seats and is eager to keep them in its quest for a majority.
Bill 101 is often credited in Quebec for saving the French language from decline and, to many in the province, it's as much of an identifying symbol as the fleur-de-lys flag.
Attacking the 1977 law has been a taboo subject for politicians for more than a generation. Before it, Quebec underwent a turbulent era of street protests and even riots over language.
But Bernier told Maritime Morning with Jordi Morgan, on Halifax's News 95.7, that Quebecers don't need it to protect their language.
He made the comment as part of a broader discussion -- about whether governments have a role to play in creating a national identity through legislation, with laws like the Canada Health Act.
Bernier said it's not government's role to create an identity, and he used Quebec's language law as an example.
"It's like in Quebec -- we don't need Bill 101 to protect the French language over there," Bernier told his interviewer.
"They know we speak French in Quebec and we will speak French for a long time, I believe it."
Enacted by the Parti Quebecois under Rene Levesque, the law had two main provisions: it limited access to English public schools and restricted English on street signs.
Over time, the law has been watered down somewhat by Supreme Court decisions prompted by lawsuits. For instance, public billboards can now include English as long as the French characters are bigger.
The law does draw criticism from Anglo-rights activists and some francophones and immigrants who would like to send their children to English school.
But, within Quebec's political class, any chatter about language laws is inevitably about whether to toughen them -- not about whether they're useful.
The opposition Parti Quebecois is currently floating the idea of extending its restrictions on schooling to CEGEP, or junior college, because an increasing number of immigrant students have been switching to English once they're old enough to get the chance.
A recent study commissioned by a Quebec teacher's union suggested those students usually become members of the Anglo community afterward which, it argued, inevitably chips away at the demographic weight of francophones.
Proponents of toughening the law argue that, given the broad global appeal of English, French would disappear in North America without legislation enforcing its use.
Bernier took issue with that idea in Friday's interview.
During the same interview, the ex-minister made national headlines by saying the federal government was prepared to open up the telecomms industry to foreign competition.
Before he switched to use the Quebec example, he and the host were involved in a back-and-forth discussion about whether the national government had a role to play in establishing identity.
The staunch libertarian doubts it. He cast Quebec's language issue in similar terms as national laws designed to assert a Canadian identity and called the examples comparable.
"It's the same thing with (federal) legislation," Bernier told the host.
"When you just said, 'Oh, we need that to protect our identity -- I think people know we're different from the U.S. and they don't need legislation to tell them that."
