MONTREAL — Canadians overwhelmingly rejected the concept of Quebec nationhood in a new poll released Tuesday, one day after all parties in Parliament declared the Quebecois a nation within Canada.
Outside Quebec, 77 per cent of Canadians rejected the idea the province forms a nation, suggested the Leger Marketing survey conducted for the TVA television network and distributed to The Canadian Press.
Among regional, linguistic and Liberal party breakdowns, French-speaking Quebeckers, at 71 per cent, were the only group to “personally consider that Quebeckers form a nation.”
The exact question in the Nov. 16-26 poll was, “Currently, there is a political debate on recognizing Quebec as a nation. Do you personally consider that Quebeckers form a nation or not?”
Canadians from every region outside Quebec, non-francophone Quebeckers (62 per cent), Liberal party supporters (72 per cent), francophone Canadians outside Quebec (77 per cent) all resoundingly rejected the idea.
“These numbers surprise me, they're so clear across the country,” Leger Marketing president Jean-Marc Leger said in an interview.
“You look at francophones outside Quebec, it's the same result. You look at Liberal supporters, it's the same thing. Overall, outside the French in Quebec, all the other groups across the country are against this notion.”
Support for Quebec nationhood ranged from 11 per cent in the Prairie provinces to 19 per cent in Alberta.
The poll of 1,527 Canadians is considered accurate within 2.6 percentage points, 19 times out of 20. The regional and linguistic breakdowns have larger margins of error.
It was released a day after the Commons endorsed a Conservative motion stating that the Quebecois form a nation within a united Canada.
Jean Johnson, president of the French-Canadian Association of Alberta, said the concept of a Quebec nation was settled within Quebec decades ago.
“Taking this dialogue to the federal level creates an isolation between the two francophone communities, the community in Quebec and outside,” he said.
“It's not a useful situation in creating a united country.”
When the federal government recognizes Quebecois and ignores the rest of French Canada “we're really persona non grata,” he said. “We're second-class citizens. It's very emotional, and it's a feeling of being rejected.”
Every debate over special status for Quebec makes francophones outside the province the target of hardliners who are intolerant of minority language rights, Mr. Johnson said.
The poll also indicated Liberal leadership hopeful Bob Rae would win if Canadians or Liberal supporters made the decision instead of delegates at the party convention this week.
Mr. Rae led the field with 17 per cent support among Canadians and Liberal party supporters, with Michael Ignatieff, Ken Dryden and Stephane Dion all stuck around 10 per cent support with both Liberals and Canadians in general.
Mr. Dryden said he's “not surprised” he's as popular as Mr. Ignatieff, even though he's running a distant fifth with just more than 5 per cent of the elected delegates to the leadership convention.
He said Liberals are so focused on delegate counts that they've lost sight of the bigger question: Who can win the next election?
“The test of the broad perspective is a national election and it's for us to put that in our heads because that is what it's about,” he said in an interview.
“It is always more useful to do it ahead of time, rather than later.”
The poll also suggested Mr. Rae had more support than Mr. Ignatieff as a second choice of the other six candidates vying for the leadership.
Mr. Leger said his poll tells a dramatic tale of how Canada's political class is disconnected form the people on both the national question and the Liberal leadership.
“The political world is so different than the real world,” Mr. Leger said.
“The real world would choose Bob Rae and the real world would never vote for the nation concept.”
The poll also suggested support has remained relatively steady for the national parties, with the Conservatives at 34 per cent and the Liberals at 32 per cent.
Mr. Leger said the nation debate hasn't harmed either of the parties most deeply embroiled in the controversy at the time of the poll.
