Why did Carney’s Plains of Abraham speech resonate so poorly in Quebec?

OTTAWA — It was a speech meant to promote national unity. But it instead provoked a near unanimous reaction in Quebec that Ottawa is disconnected from its historic reality.

Fresh off his trip to Davos, Prime Minister Mark Carney travelled to Quebec City, where he held his cabinet retreat, to deliver a speech meant to inspire Canadians at home on the choices made throughout history and the values of inclusion that subsist today.

Carney chose to deliver his speech only in front of media, surrounded by his ministers, in the Citadelle of Quebec, a military fortification that overlooks the Plains of Abraham.

The crucial battle that took place there in 1759 is considered to be a pivotal moment in the Seven Years’ War and the history of Canada. The British prevailed over French troops, and France’s defeat led to the country surrendering the territory of New France to Britain.

“The Plains of Abraham mark a battlefield, and also the place where Canada began to make its founding choice of accommodation over assimilation, of partnership over domination, of building together over pulling apart,” Carney said in French.

While he mentioned in passing some darker moments of history such as the Deportation of the Acadians or the Durham Report, the political class was quick to react in Quebec.

Parti Québécois Leader Paul St-Pierre Plamondon accused Carney of falsifying history, while Bloc Québécois Leader Yves-François Blanchet demanded Carney apologize.

Quebec Immigration Minister Jean-François Roberge also slammed Carney for rewriting history. “The Battle of the Plains of Abraham are the conquest, the culmination point where the English came and defeated the French and burned villages,” he told Radio-Canada.

Even Liberal Party of Quebec leadership hopeful Charles Milliard, a proud federalist, said that Carney’s speech in Quebec City would have benefitted from more nuance.

“The survival of a francophone nation in America does not rest on a ‘chosen partnership’ with British administrators, but on the resilience, determination and spirit of resistance of French Canadians and Quebecers. We cannot ignore the darker parts of our history.”

Even some in Carney’s government did not exactly offer praise for the speech.

Heritage Minister Marc Miller said he had not seen the speech. As for Quebec MP Steven Guilbeault, he said he had no comment.

Daniel Béland, the director of the McGill Institute for the Study of Canada, said that the Battle of the Plains of Abraham is a symbol of humiliation and defeat for many francophones.

He said it is the political equivalent of former prime minister Justin Trudeau giving a speech in Calgary’s “Red Square” — formerly the Petro-Canada Centre, which is reminiscent of his father’s National Energy Program — to improve his relationship with Alberta.

“So, maybe Mark Carney could have talked about collaboration and unity, but without starting this discussion about the Plains of Abraham and giving a speech there,” he said.

Historian Éric Bédard underlined that British General James Wolfe, who had lost several battles prior to the one on the Plains, had compared French Canadians to “vermin” in his letters in 1759 and wrote his goal was to leave them with “famine and desolation.”

That summer, Wolfe ordered the bombardment of Quebec City with more than 13,000 cannonballs fired on the civil population, said Bédard. Seeing that they were not capitulating, Wolfe ordered the destruction of nearby villages north and south.

“What Wolfe and Great Britain tried to impose by force was their hegemony,” wrote Bédard in La Presse , in a comment directed at Carney’s speech in Davos about bullies and “hegemons.”

Carney’s address in Quebec City happened just as the PQ convention was set to start and added fuel to the fire of St-Pierre Plamondon who is already riding high in the polls.

Speaking on Sunday, the PQ leader said Carney had launched the referendum campaign.

“I never thought I would have to say this, but no, the Plains of Abraham are not the birthplace of a united Canada,” St-Pierre Plamondon told the crowd of 1,500 people.

“The Plains of Abraham have never been the symbol of a supposed partnership or collaboration,” he continued. “They are rather the clear symbol of the domination of one nation over another.”

Speaking at an unrelated press conference on Monday, Carney said he recognized in his speech the resilience of francophones and the attempts to assimilate them.

“It’s a very difficult history,” he said in French. “But we protected and, after a period, reinforced the French language, the French culture, the Quebec culture, institutions like the Civil Code and other institutions. And that is the genius of Canada.”

“Canada is not perfect, but there’s a way of living that is better,” he said.

Béland said the speech shows that Carney probably needs to get better advice in terms of what he does and says in Quebec, and that he should probably let his francophone politicians, including his Quebec lieutenant Joël Lightbound, give more speeches.

That is a view shared by political organizer and climate activist Alex Cool-Fergus who also happens to be Liberal MP Greg Fergus’ eldest daughter.

In a post on Substack, Cool-Fergus said the prime minister seems to hold himself to “impossibly high standards” and must “decide what he personally can prioritize in the limited time he has in a day.” He should be ready to delegate the rest, she said.

“There exists an entire roster of ministers and a small army of staffers willing and eager to prove themselves. Last anyone checked, most of them are supposed to be equipped to make decisions over their own files,” she wrote.

“It would be nice if Carney gave them the authority to do so.”

National Post calevesque@postmedia.com

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