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By Philip Authier
OTTAWA — Fifty-per-cent plus one is indeed the level of support Quebec would need to secede from Canada, New Democratic Party leader Jack Layton said Thursday.
Hammered in Quebec for waffling on the question earlier this week, Layton clarified his views at a news conference called to make public the names of the members of his shadow cabinet.
“What constitutes a majority is 50 per cent plus one,” Layton said bluntly. “It’s in our official policies. It’s been adopted in our Sherbrooke declaration. That’s been crystal clear for five years as official policy of our party.”
But Layton was not so clear Tuesday at the end of the first day of a two-day NDP caucus strategy session. He specifically refused to say that very sentence despite being asked nine times.
He instead referred to a Supreme Court advisory written in 1998, which later became the Clarity Act, which allows the House of Commons to decide if a referendum question is clear and what a majority would mean.
Layton appeared to be distancing himself from NDP party policy on the issue of Quebec’s self-determination included in the 2005 Sherbrooke declaration. That declaration says the Quebec legislature is free to write its own question and that 50 per cent plus one is enough to decide on secession.
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A hot-button issue among politicians of all stripes in Quebec, Layton’s ambiguity earned him a stiff rebuke from federalists and nationalists who re-affirmed the 50 per cent rule applies.
Parti Quebecois leader Pauline Marois accused Layton of reneging on promises he made in the last election campaign.
“He said Quebecers’ choices should be respected, based on the 50 per cent plus one,” Marois said. “Now that he is in the House of Commons, he goes back on his commitments and orientations. I think we are seeing his real face and that is a great worry to Quebec.”
Even in his own caucus, made up of MPs from Quebec and the rest of Canada, the view is split, leading to speculation of trouble ahead for Layton on the sovereignty issue as he tries to walk the line.
But on Thursday, Layton insisted he was not vague at all, noting that he did say the Sherbrooke declaration is still the policy on the books.
“I said it and I repeat it today,” Layton said. “It has been our policy for a long time and it continues.
“No ambiguity. It was a position adopted in public at our policy convention in Quebec. Fifty-per cent plus one has been our position for a long time. No doubt about this.”
Asked in English whether he plans to ask sovereigntist members of his caucus to “park their views at the door,” Layton responded: “Every one of our MPs knows we are a federalist party. This is a group of one political stripe — orange. And they know that our goal is to try and create those winning conditions for Canada in Quebec.
“Every one of them has signed on to that project.”
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