DON MACPHERSON
The Gazette Saturday 11 August 2001

The telephone was ringing this week, with French-language interviewers seeking "an anglophone viewpoint." This is noteworthy because Quebec anglophone viewpoints are generally considered of little interest, except on two occasions.

One is after the abrupt resignation of a premier and every available francophone viewpoint has been heard at least twice but the news specials still have many minutes of airtime to fill. At that point, the need for fresh reinforcements becomes as great as in the last desperate days of a losing war, and even accented reserves must be called up to the front lines to replace the exhausted francophone talking heads.

The other occasion that sets the telephone to ringing is when the anglo natives show signs of restlessness, as when a famous anglo-rights hard-liner is about to become president of Alliance Quebec and, thus, the generally recognized spokesman for the English-speaking community, which was the case this week.

Recognized by Media

That is, he or she is generally recognized as spokesman by the media, if not by the more than 99 per cent of the community itself whose only connection with the Alliance is that they are among the federal taxpayers who provide virtually all its budget.

In the present case, the anglo hard-liner is lawyer Brent Tyler, already known to francophones as the relentless and diabolically ingenious courtroom challenger of the legislation that is supposed to protect their language.

In all likelihood, at a meeting behind closed doors next Wednesday of the 41-member, hard-liner-dominated Alliance board, Tyler will be chosen as interim president until the organization's annual general meeting next May. He will replace Anthony Housefather, who resigned to follow his dream of a political career under the banner of Gerald Tremblay, champion of the anglo soon-to-be-former suburbanites in November's Montreal election.

Surprisingly, there are actually two other candidates who claim to want the job: Jo-Anne Frandrich, the Alliance's vice-president for "the mainland" (outside Montreal) and Gerry Kelebay, a McGill education professor and member of the Alliance's board. Both are unknown in the community and Tyler wouldn't have run if he weren't confident of winning after sounding out board members.

Got Attention

So thanks to Tyler, and the fact that not much else has been happening in Quebec politics lately, the English-speaking community has finally got the attention of francophones. But the answer to the question, "What does it all mean, Tyler's becoming president of Alliance Quebec?" is "Not much" - not much for the English-speaking community, certainly not much for Quebec and, probably, not even very much for the Alliance.

It will be great for Tyler, who will have a platform (as well as more direct access to the decision-making process as to whether the Alliance will fund his court cases). And the new anglo "spokesman" will give the English-speaking community a different face and voice in the media.

But it won't give any political leverage to the English-speaking community, whose "pequophobia," or fear of the Parti Quebecois and especially separation, has made it the electoral hostage of the Quebec Liberal Party. For a long time, the hard-liners claimed the political problems of the community all came down to a question of leadership; everything would be fine if only one of theirs was speaking for the community instead of the self-perpetuating "lamb" Establishment. That argument was disproved by hard-liner William Johnson's two-year presidency of the Alliance.

Tyler was Johnson's right-hand man in the constant internal feuding that characterized the Alliance under Johnson's leadership, and the anti-Johnson dissidents complained that Tyler constantly tried to intimidate them with threats of legal action. (Tyler says the dissidents were violating the organization's constitution.)

Johnson won the power struggle when the dissidents left, but that weakened the Alliance. If Tyler is to repair the damage, he will need to show diplomatic skills and a willingness to compromise for which he is not yet known.