The French language has become a contentious point in trade negotiations between Canada and the U.S. French was listed as one of the key issues that forced Canada to suspend talks. In recent years, the U.S. identified Bill 96 (An Act respecting French, the official and common language of Quebec) and 109 (An Act to affirm the cultural sovereignty of Quebec and to enact the Act respecting the discoverability of French-language cultural content in the digital environment) as trade barriers. Quebec Premier Christine Fréchette said it was a red line that could not be crossed and that Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney was right to halt talks. “Our culture, our language, is central to our identity, and it is important to exclude that from the negotiation table,” said Fréchette. It may have surprised some, but it’s not the first time the American administration is at odds with Quebec language laws. Last year, Bill 96 caught the attention of the trump administration, which listed it as a foreign trade barrier. The law requires products sold in Quebec to have a French description, and trademarks using generic terms have to be translated into French. “The bilingual packaging is a barrier to trade,” said economist Moshe Lander. “It’s not that much different than tariffs or quotas or interprovincial barriers. It harms the ability for businesses to freely sell their products.” Bill 109 means streaming services like Netflix, Spotify and Apple have to promote and prioritize French content for Quebec users. “We’re still waiting for specific regulations under Bill 109, which is now law,” said technology analyst Carmi Levy. “We don’t know exactly how much French needs to be embedded in content, how the interfaces for streamers like Netflix and Amazon Prime and Disney Plus would need to change.” In March, the U.S. also called Bill 109 a potential trade barrier. “I don’t think when Bill 109 was initially introduced, that we could have foreseen that it would come to this, and yet here we are,” said Levy The prime minister said during negotiations there were threats against the French language and Quebec culture. “Continual efforts always resistant, as i said in my remarks, and always will be resistant, efforts to restrict our protections of our language, our culture and, in effect, our sovereignty,” said Carney. Lander said it’s all part of trade negotiations. “Everybody’s going to have their own standards, their own rules, their own institutions and their own history and culture, and they’re going to build a system on those things,” he said. “So somebody from the outside is going to say, wait a second, I don’t agree with that.” It was clearly a step too far for Canada, with Ottawa unwilling to compromise on French language protections.
