Quebec separatist leader demands Canada cut ties with UK monarchy
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Some fellow lawmakers were not in favor and labeled Blanchet's motion as a publicity stunt.
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Yves-François Blanchet (The Canadian Press)
Canada’s Quebec separatist party leader, Yves-François Blanchet, called for cutting ties with what he called the “incredibly racist” and “slave-driven” British monarchy on Tuesday in the House of Commons.
“It’s archaic. It’s a thing of the past. It’s almost archaeological. It’s humiliating,” said the Bloc Québécois leader to lawmakers in parliament regarding Canada’s ties to the UK. He stated that members of his party were “forced” to pledge allegiance to a “conquering” empire, calling the oaths “meaningless”, after adding that Bloc members were true to Quebecers, not to the monarchy.
King Charles, who has visited the country 18 times, was a “foreigner who knows nothing about Canada”, according to Blanchet, and would potentially fail in passing the country’s citizenship test.
Several nations have been skeptical of their ties to the UK after Queen Elizabeth's death - a UK that people of these nations see as outdated and irrelevant to their daily lives.
Some lawmakers have criticized Blanchet’s motion and labeled it a publicity stunt.
To Blanchet's misfortune, his request would not only have little chance of success, but would not end up severing ties anyway, due to the country's constitution requiring the stamp of approval from all 10 provinces and both houses of parliament.
Blanchet's party is even regarded as irrelevant to Canadians in general by Conservative parliament member Pierre Paul-Hus, who called the motion “part of the Bloc’s long tradition of political spin” and expressed: “They are looking for a pretext to justify their very existence in this chamber, which they call a foreign parliament.”
The separatist MP wrote in an editorial, in light of this, and ahead of the parliamentary vote on Wednesday, that the remaining part of the Commonwealth was “at odds” with Canadians' democratic values.
Taking into consideration the tensions between Quebec and much of Canada, he expressed that no citizen should have to provide power and pledge allegiance to a country “that is neither like us nor shares our interests”.
“Our respective peoples deserve better than the monarchy, of that I am sincerely convinced,” he wrote.
