With referendums now being threatened in Alberta and Quebec, the current prime minister and his cabinet should remember what we almost forgot: ‘Les absents ont toujours tort.’
By Sheila Copps
First published in The Hill Times on November 3, 2025.
OTTAWA—Thirty years ago last week, Canada’s future hung in the balance.
In a second referendum in less than 15 years, it looked very likely that Quebec was going to vote to separate in 1995.
At the time, many argued the question was misleading, as it asked voters to engage in a new negotiation with Canada, and only separate if the negotiations failed.
Whatever the nature of the question, the momentum was on the side of the “Yes” vote. Of course, the Parti Québécois government established the question and their answer was a positive ”Yes.”
From the beginning of the campaign, the Parti Québécois appealed to the heart. Their posters featured springlike sunflowers offering a happy world after separation, with the Canadian dollar and the Armed Forces remaining intact.
The “No” team ran a campaign of the pocketbook, suggesting that the cost of separation would be too onerous to bear, and that the quality of life of Quebecers would suffer if the province tried to go it alone. In an election campaign, pocketbook issues usually work. But when it comes to the fight for a country, suggesting that the province was simply too small to succeed was a negative message that did not sit well with Quebecers.
It wasn’t surprising that less than two weeks before the vote, polling showed the separatists were pulling ahead of the “No” campaign and momentum was on their side. That was the grim message revealed to the federal cabinet and subsequently to the Wednesday caucus meeting where the frightening polling numbers were met by a stunned silence by everyone.
Politicians are not ones to sit on their hands in a crisis. They want to do something. So the federal Liberal caucus decided that it was going to organize a massive rally in Montreal at Place du Canada, and invite the rest of the country to come and tell Quebecers in person why they wanted them to stay in Canada.
In my own case, I organized 14 school buses from Hamilton, Ont. Contrary to press reports, every person paid their own way, chipping in $20 for the round trip. The group travelled 10 hours each way, attended the rally and immediately returned home. A 20-hour ride in a school bus is a sacrifice, and the gesture definitely bore witness to the love Canadians had for Quebec.
The massive rally of more than 100,000 people was reluctantly accepted by the “No” committee. They made it very obvious from the beginning of the campaign that they did not want to hear from anyone outside Quebec. Nor did they want to hear from then-prime minister Jean Chrétien, as they claimed he was unpopular in la belle province.
In the face of certain defeat, Chrétien and the caucus ignored the committee’s advice. Chrétien hosted a televised rally at the Verdun Auditorium where he made a plea to Quebecers to remain in Canada, promising federal recognition of a “distinct society” after the referendum.
As for the rally, the “No” campaign was so afraid of campaigners from outside the province that when then-Liberal MP Brian Tobin and I stood on the stage to pep up the audience in advance of the official event, the organizers pulled the plug on our electricity. Their view was this should be decided by Quebecers. But when we arrived at the Place du Canada for the rally, hundreds of people asked us, “What took you so long?”
In French, there is an expression that says: “the absentees are always wrong.” The prime minister, cabinet, and caucus had largely been absent from the campaign, and had the last-minute intervention not bypassed referendum organizers, our country could have been lost forever.
In some instances, “No” organizers said that they wanted to win, but they didn’t want to win too big. Claude Garcia, an insurance executive, was excoriated at the beginning of the campaign when he dared to tell a rally “it isn’t enough to win, we have to crush them.”
For that affirmation, he was attacked by most members of the “No” committee who accused him of playing hardball in a family setting. But when your country is at stake, there is something worth fighting for.
Post-referendum surveys showed that 69 per cent of Quebecers who knew an anglophone who voted “no.” That tells us that this is a fight for all Canadians and in both official languages, and others.
With referendums now being threatened in Alberta and Quebec, the current prime minister and his cabinet should remember what we almost forgot: “Les absents ont toujours tort.”
Sheila Copps is a former Jean Chrétien-era cabinet minister and a former deputy prime minister. Follow her on Twitter at @Sheila_Copps.
