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2002
5/12/2002 Fighting for the little guy
Through the association he founded in the early 1990s to protect the interests of individual investors and savers, Yves Michaud has been a thorn in the side of lax corporate boards, auditors and greedy CEOs. Yves Michaud never ducks a fight. Recently, he has taken on banks, big business and the Quebec National Assembly. But Michaud is less known for another cause he represents: the rights of individual investors. Through an organization he founded in the mid-1990s, Michaud has been a thorn in the side of lax corporate boards, auditors and greedy CEOs, all, he says, on behalf of the little guy.
Through the association he founded in the early 1990s to protect the interests of individual investors and savers, Yves Michaud has been a thorn in the side of lax corporate boards, auditors and greedy CEOs.
In fact, during 1999 and 2000, the APIEQ achieved a considerable victory, getting Canada's banks to disclose the amount of audit and consulting fees they were paying to their public accountants.
APIEQ has also been ahead of the curve on other key issues; notably the separation of the CEO and chairman functions and the expansive use of stock options for executive compensation, issues that are getting increasing attention in the financial community.
According to a spokesman for the Commission des Valeurs Mobilières du Québec who has seen Michaud in action over the years, APEIQ fills an important niche.
...."The securities commissions do a good job, and investor confidence in the markets continues to be high, but they definitely have their place," said the spokesman. "Someone has to speak up for individual investors."
Participation in the Canadian stock market has grown steadily during the last five years, reaching 49 per cent in 2001, according to the Toronto Stock Exchange.
This ranges from a high of 57 per cent in B.C., to a low of 35 per cent in Quebec. Five-year growth was between 10 and 14 per cent, depending on the province.
...On the other hand, this is not a big problem to institutional investors who can afford to hire full-time accountants to decipher what companies are really saying in their corporate financial statements.
"We used to have to just buy one share in a company to be able to attend annual meetings and make shareholder motions," Michaud said.
"But last year, they changed the Canada Business Corporations Act to slow us down. Now a shareholder has to own $2,000 worth of stock in a company for at least six months before he can take part."
Wed 1/9/02
MICHAUD DENIES ANTI-SEMITIC REMARKS IN COURT CASE
Hard-line Quebec separatist Yves Michaud has denied making any anti-semitic statements during proceedings in his defamation case against a McGill University professor.
2001
Dec 12th 2001
Michaud petition accepted in National Assembly >
Quebec City - The Landry government has opened the door to an apology to Yves Michaud, one year after the National Assembly unanimously denounced Michaud for comments about Jews and other ethnic minorities he made at public hearings.
The Parti Quebecois MNA from Assomption made Michaud's case to the National Assembly. Jean-Claude St. André presented Michaud's petititon Thursday morning.
Mon 5/21/01 6:59 AM There's something unsettling in the air
By: TOMMY SCHNURMACHER
Five years ago, partition was a hot topic. These days, the only one talking about it is the delightful Yves Michaud, who brought it up at yet another one of his urgent press conferences.
Michaud is none too pleased that B'nai Brith Quebec director Robert Libman and aboriginal leaders feel that Quebec's borders would be subject to negotiation after secession
Thu 5/17/01 6:59 AM Michaud lashes out at 'extremists' who support partition
By: NICOLAS VAN PRAET
Disgraced Parti Quebecois member Yves Michaud ducked into another round of controversy yesterday, calling those who would question Quebec's borders after separation "extremists" who appeal to violence and hate.
Michaud attacked B'nai Brith Quebec director Robert Libman in particular, but his comments also targeted others, including aboriginal leaders, who have said Quebec's borders may have to be redrawn if the province gains independence.
7/May/2001 Michaud has no case
If Yves Michaud were faintly interested in rehabilitating his reputation, he would apologize for his remarks about Jews and immigrants, retire into obscurity and hope that in some not too distant future he would be forgiven by his fellow citizens. But a man who would have the good sense to do that would not be the same man who made the remarks in the first place.
A reminder about the remarks: last December, Mr. Michaud, 70, a former Parti Quebecois MNA and onetime diplomat, was seeking the PQ nomination in a by-election in Montreal's Mercier riding. The day nominations opened, the B'nai Brith human-rights organization made public a transcript of a radio interview Mr. Michaud had given CKAC host Paul Arcand a week earlier. In the interview, Mr. Michaud said that Jews think they "are the only people in the history of the world to suffer" and that he had "just about had it" with this attitude.
Fri 5/4/01 8:00 PM MICHAUD ASKS TO TELL HIS SIDE OF STORY
Yves Michaud may get his chance to tell his side of the story. A Parti
Quebecois MNA has tabled a petition from Michaud asking for an
opportunity to rebut the unanimous motion adopted last year condemning
his comments on Jews and the ethnic vote.
>
April 2001
News: cbc.ca/search/
March 2001
Sun 3/11/01 8:01 AM Wave of sanity By: NEIL CAMERON
Just as the Parti Quebecois convention was doing Bernard Landry the favour of withdrawing a resolution that would have renewed the internal quarrel launched by Yves Michaud, the Bloc Quebecois MP for Chambly, Ghislain Lebel, was raising the same quarrel in the Bloc. French Canadians, according to him, faced the danger of becoming a minority in an increasingly multi-ethnic Quebec and, he suggested, this identity issue should be more crucial than sovereignty itself.
Lebel had supported the recent restrictive notions put forward by the Bloc youth, and had been quickly denounced for racism by Bloc executives. He was promptly defended by Michaud, in a public letter to the Fondation Lionel Groulx, which claimed that "a wave of craziness" had hit both parties, this "indecency' including a repudiation of Groulx himself.
Wed 3/7/01 7:02 AM Michaud comes out as the big winner
By: DON MACPHERSON
If there was a struggle between Lucien Bouchard and Yves Michaud for the soul of the Parti Quebecois, the winner, by default, is Michaud.
True, Michaud ultimately lost the PQ nomination for the Mercier by-election to a black of Haitian origin who was put forward specifically in response to Michaud's xenophobic remarks last December about Jews and immigrants.
Wed 2/21/01 6:32 AM Anti-Semitism increases in city
By: CATHERINE SOLYOM The Gazette
From swastikas to subway beatings to the so-called "Michaud affair," anti-Semitic incidents in Montreal almost doubled last year, despite a decline in the rest of Canada, B'nai Brith reports.
Montreal was the scene of 71 incidents described as anti-Semitic in 2000, up from 37 in 1999 and the most recorded since the national Jewish group started keeping track in 1982.
Sat 2/17/01 8:03 AM Michaud affair won't go away
By: JOSEE LEGAULT
Some premiers retire with their political houses mostly in order. Others leave their successor with a messy situation or two that any new leader would rather do without. So it goes for Bernard Landry who could well inherit the so-called Michaud affair should it not be resolved before Lucien Bouchard's departure in early March. Not a fun thing.
Witness the half-page ad in Yves Michaud's defence this week in Le Devoir and the interviews he's been giving to various television and radio stations. It's clear that Michaud doesn't intend to let this thing go. He seems to consider that his dignity and reputation have been greatly tarnished by a unanimous motion adopted by the National Assembly last December condemning what it referred to as Michaud's unacceptable statements on some cultural communities. So far, he's had the support of many Quebecers who, whether they agree with his specific statements or not, feel that the National Assembly should refrain from using its power to condemn the words of a private citizen.
Fri 2/16/01 7:32 AM Michaud quest is doomed By: MICHEL DAVID Le Soleil
One thing must be admitted about Yves Michaud: he's as tenacious as a mongoose. Lucien Bouchard's departure didn't put an end to the affair. Now Bernard Landry is stuck with the hot potato.
For weeks, Michaud has been inundating members of the National Assembly with daily E-mails containing assorted testimonials and quotes designed to clear him of accusations of anti-Semitism implicit in the censure motion they unanimously passed last December. So far there has been no result.
Fri 2/16/01 7:32 AM Still a good friend: Landry praises Michaud
By: KEVIN DOUGHERTY The Gazette
Even though Yves Michaud is threatening a drawn-out legal battle over a National Assembly motion condemning his remarks about ethnic minorities and Jews, premier-in-waiting Bernard Landry said yesterday he still considers Michaud a friend.
In a telephone interview, Michaud said he wanted Premier Lucien Bouchard "to settle the bill" before he leaves office. If Bouchard does not make amends to Michaud, he is prepared to wage a legal battle that could go on for years "on the back of Bernard Landry."
Thu 2/15/01 6:53 AM Michaud threatens to sue
By: PHILIP AUTHIER, MICHELLE LALONDE
Yves Michaud and his supporters are threatening to take the National Assembly to court if the legislature does not undo the damage he says it caused to his reputation and integrity when it passed a motion condemning him for his remarks about Jews.
The threat appeared yesterday in the bottom paragraph of a half-page ad in the French-language daily newspaper Le Devoir, placed by a group of Michaud supporters calling themselves Solidarite Yves Michaud.
Wed 2/14/01 7:24 AM Assembly's Michaud motion stands: Landry
By: PHILIP AUTHIER The Gazette
Premier-in-waiting Bernard Landry last night slammed the door on having the National Assembly revisit the Yves Michaud controversy.
Despite Michaud's insistence that he was wronged when the National Assembly unanimously condemned his remarks about Jews before Christmas, Landry bluntly said he is not willing to reopen the debate.
20/Jan/2001 Have a nice life, Mr. Bouchard
By: JOSH FREED The Gazette
Dear Premier-for-now Bouchard:
Whenever I go on vacation, the anglo in me gets a little bit paranoid: I worry that something will happen in Quebec while I'm away and everyone I know will move to Toronto.
19/Jan/2001 Why did Bouchard do it?
By: GRETTA CHAMBERS The French Press
The moment Lucien Bouchard announced he was quitting as premier and Parti Quebecois leader, the media focused on the reasons that led the most popular politician in Quebec to give up politics.
Interpretations of the dramatic decision varied, with every commentator adding his or her pinch of salt to what was uniformly described as a bitter brew.
15/Jan/2001 BOUCHARD'S RESIGNATION SHOWS QUEBECERS' TRUE PREOCCUPATION: MARTIN
Paul Martin says Premier Lucien Bouchard's resignation is a sign that
Quebecers are more interested in the economy than sovereignty.
What is next? see WEDNESDAY-NIGHT #835, March 4th, 1998
Mon 3/5/01 7:02 AM Michaud motion dropped, but issue far from dead By: PHILIP AUTHIER
The Parti Quebecois yesterday dodged a nasty internal squabble over the Yves Michaud affair, when a motion demanding that the party apologize to him was withdrawn at the last minute by its author.
Arguing that he wanted to spare the party's new leader, Bernard Landry, any further embarrassment, Georges-etienne Cartier took to the floor at a party national-council meeting just as the resolution came up for debate.
Wed 2/28/01 7:02 AM PQ to debate motion supporting Michaud
By: PHILIP AUTHIER The Gazette
The Yves Michaud affair will come back and haunt the Parti Quebecois this weekend, with his supporters planning a fresh charge to rehabilitate his tarnished reputation at a party national-council meeting.
"Until this is fixed, the party is stained," said staunch Michaud supporter Andre Reny, president of the Mercier riding association, which originally tried to draft Michaud as a candidate for a coming by-election. "We are going to repair the monstrous error that was made."
22/Jan/2001 Cote St. Luc councillors rip Michaud for remarks
By: DARREN BECKER The Gazette
Cote St. Luc city council has broken its wall of silence surrounding the Yves Michaud affair by condemning the outspoken former MNA's comments about "ethnic votes" in the largely federalist municipality.
The council has adopted a resolution stating the city condemns anyone who by "word, gesture or implication, tries to intimidate residents' right to exercise their vote."
13/Jan/2001 The Bouchard dividend
By: JAY BRYAN
Lucien Bouchard has long been acknowledged as probably the most charismatic Canadian politician of our time, and his ability to weave a spell was never more evident than in the fulsome praise for his supposed statesmanship unleashed by his unexpected resignation.
Bouchard certainly did Quebec a valuable service by using a good part of his farewell speech to excoriate the vicious intolerance promoted by such Parti Quebecois stalwarts as Yves Michaud and Jacques Parizeau. But a single act of statesmanship doesn't wipe out the manifold failures and misdeeds of Bouchard's own political career.
13/Jan/2001 Bouchard petty, belligerent: Michaud
By: ELIZABETH THOMPSON The Gazette
Outspoken sovereignist Yves Michaud broke his self-imposed silence yesterday, saying Lucien Bouchard's attack on him in his resignation speech was unworthy of a premier.
"Mr. Bouchard has the right to lead his life as he wants," Michaud said in a telephone interview. "But to make petty and belligerent remarks regarding me does not befit a premier."
Jan 15 2001 Michaud abandons bid for PQ seat
Bitterly blames bouchard Graeme Hamilton
15/Jan/2001 Michaud will sit out vote
By: PHILIP AUTHIER The Gazette
The man who touched off the powder keg in the Parti Quebecois and possibly contributed to the resignation of Premier Lucien Bouchard announced yesterday he won't seek the nomination for the by-election in the Plateau Mont Royal riding of Mercier after all.
But Yves Michaud is not the least bit repentant and, in fact, heaps blame for the crisis on Bouchard, accusing him of "intransigence," and having been used by the B'nai Brith human-rights organization, which he says launched a campaign of "hatred, disinformation and insults," to discredit him.
13/Jan/2001 MICHAUD OFFERS NO APOLOGIES
Yves Michaud says the comments made about him by Lucien Bouchard in his
resignation speech are not worthy of a Premier.
13/Jan/2001 PQ needs to re-examine ideas: Chevrette
By: KEVIN DOUGHERTY The Gazette
The shock wave that rocked Parti Quebecois ranks after Lucien Bouchard announced his resignation as leader Thursday should stimulate a debate on the party's orientations, says Transport Minister Guy Chevrette.
Chevrette, a PQ veteran who was first elected in 1976 and has announced he will not seek re-election, said yesterday he hopes Finance Minister Bernard Landry, Health Minister Pauline Marois 15% and others come forward as candidates to succeed Bouchard. "I hope there is a real leadership race. We need a debate of ideas."
Lawyer Julius Grey Julius Grey calls Lucien Bouchard a
brilliant leader who will be sorely missed on the political landscape.
Although the human rights lawyer has often gone to court to defend
his clients against this province's laws, Grey says Quebec has always
been an honourable adversary.
He calls Bouchard a tragic figure.
"He has very strong ideas and a tremendous amount of talent. And he
could not carry out his ideas because he fell in between. He's a strong
nationalist who is not quite a sovereignist," Grey says.
"He says
he's a sovereignist but of course he defines sovereignty in a less
complete way than the hardliners. And he was squeezed out on the one
hand by his adversaries who were totally federalist and his adversaries
who were unshakeably sovereignist," he says.
Grey calls Bouchard
a leader who never quite found his party.
|
   Maite Ormaechea reports for CBC TV |
A new era yawns on coffee row
By: MIKE BOONE The Gazette
The face of post-Bouchard Quebec didn't want his name in the newspaper. I even had to promise to fudge physical details and the precise nature of his occupation. These are nervous times - especially for an albino dwarf fur trapper.
I met the 6-foot-5 female impersonator at Open Da Night, a coffee bar at the corner of St. Viateur and Waverly Sts. It's in the heart of the Mile End district and at the epicentre of a multicultural Montreal that spooks Yves Michaud. /a>
11/Jan/2001 Bouchard to step down as premier, PQ leader
By: ELIZABETH THOMPSON, SEAN GORdON, PHILIP AUTHIER and KEVIN DOUGHERTY
Parti Quebecois faithful were in shock last night after Lucien Bouchard broke the news to his inner circle that he will announce today he is stepping down as premier of Quebec and head of the party.
While many reasons likely contributed to the decision, top PQ officials said last night the Michaud affair and a full-page ad supporting party hard-liner Yves Michaud in Le Devoir yesterday were the last straws for Bouchard.
Wed 12/27/00 8:00 PM GROUP SAYS MICHAUD SHOULD BE ABLE TO APPEAL
Another nationalist group has come out in support of Yves Michaud. The
former MNA is seeking the Parti Québécois nomination in the Montreal
riding of Mercier. FULL STORY: montreal.cbc.ca/cgi-bin/view?/news/2000/12/27/michaud001227
25/Dec/2000 MICHAUD AS PQ MEMBER WOULD NOT FARE WELL INTERNATIONALLY: LANDRY
Quebec Deputy Premier Bernard Landry is warning the Parti Québécois
against endorsing controversial candidate Yves Michaud.
24/Dec/2000 Michaud knows shorthand for Jews
By: TOMMY SCHNURMACHER
To heave Yves or not to heave?
To leave or not to leave?
23/Dec/2000 MICHAUD AS PQ MEMBER WOULD NOT FARE WELL INTERNATIONALLY: LANDRY
Quebec Deputy Premier Bernard Landry is warning the Parti Québécois
against endorsing controversial candidate Yves Michaud
23/Dec/2000 No gift for PM
By: JOSH FREED The Gazette
From the office of Santa Josh:
It's almost Christmas and I'm way behind schedule, what with my reindeer stuck in a snowbank, the price of gas going up, and my elves on another work slowdown. And you try to find a decent chimney to fit into these days.
Full Menu of Josh Freed works
23/Dec/2000 Different visions of PQ's role
By: JOSEE LEGAULT
If I were a member of the Parti Quebecois and a resident of the riding of Mercier, and I am neither, I wouldn't vote for Yves Michaud at the nomination assembly of March 4. The PQ government desperately needs to renew its caucus, to bring in younger, dynamic sovereignists who live in the present world, and not in the distant past. Michaud does not fit the bill - to say the least.
On top of displaying what sounds like an obsession with the way in which Jews vote in Quebec, Michaud's comments are those of a man who has never understood Rene Levesque's definition of who is a Quebecer, that is, someone who lives in Quebec, period. Being a Quebecer has nothing to do with whether one votes Yes or No in a referendum.
23/Dec/2000 The giant vs. the pygmy
By: MI< NORMAN WEBSTER The Gazette
The essential nuttiness of the Yves Michaud affair was captured in the main headline in La Presse on Thursday. Ce Sera Bouchard ou Michaud, trumpeted the black type atop Page One (It's Bouchard or Michaud).
Now this is crazy. Lucien Bouchard is first minister of Quebec, one of the finest orators on the planet, a man well-regarded by the voters and respected even by those who reject his political option. By any measure, he is a giant of our scene.
e.
23/Dec/2000 Michaud tackles the taboo
By: ELIZABETH THOMPSON The Gazette
For Yves Michaud, it is a subject nobody in the PQ has ever really dared to debate.
"This debate in the Parti Quebecois on the necessity of integrating and assimilating neo-Quebecers and immigrants has never taken place," Michaud told a television interviewer this week.
22/Dec/2000 PQ battle dominates week
By: GRETTA CHAMBERS
A week after Yves Michaud hit the front pages with his testimony before the estates-general on language, the controversy generated by his remarks deemed to trivilize the Holocaust raged as it spread to the National Assembly and into the ranks of the Parti Quebecois.
The Michaud affair has been the story of the last 10 days, fueling a flood of comment and editorial opinion for and against the unanimous National Assembly motion censuring his outburst as and unacceptable.
22/Dec/2000 The Michaud crack
By: MICHEL DAVID Freelance
Lawrence Bergman, the Liberal MNA for D'Arcy McGee, certainly didn't suspect what a bomb he was tossing into Parti Quebecois ranks with his motion condemning the remarks made by Yves Michaud at the estates-general on language.
Whatever the outcome of the duel to the death between Michaud and Premier Lucien Bouchard, the PQ and the sovereignist movement in general can only emerge severely battered.
22/Dec/2000 L'affaire Michaud makes me PuQue
By: MIKE BOONE The Gazette
The National Assembly, where you couldn't get unanimity on a motion to declare today Friday, voted unanimously to brand Yves Michaud the most evil man in Quebec.
Mom Boucher felt slighted.
22/Dec/2000 Charest wades in
By: KEVIN DOUGHERTY The Gazette
The refusal by Premier Lucien Bouchard to reject Yves Michaud as a Parti Quebecois candidate has prolonged the controversy stirred up by Michaud's finger-pointing at Quebec Jews, Liberal leader Jean Charest said yesterday.
"Mr. Bouchard should have said right away that Michaud could not be a candidate," Charest told reporters at his press conference to mark the adjournment of the National Assembly until March 13.
22/Dec/2000 Michaud in the wrong: Landry
By: ELIZABETH THOMPSON
Yves Michaud cannot become a Parti Quebecois candidate because his controversial remarks concerning Jews, the Holocaust and "ethnic" voting patterns would be an international embarrassment, Deputy Premier Bernard Landry said last night.
"If he maintains his remarks, he must not be a candidate for our party," Landry said in an interview on Radio Canada's all-news channel, RDI.
21/Dec/2000 BOUCHARD SAYS MICHAUD SHOULD REFLECT OVER HOLIDAYS
Premier Bouchard says the gravity of the offending words used by Yves Michaud have been lost in the debate over the speed with which the National Assembly condemned Michaud. FULL STORY: montreal.cbc.ca/cgi-bin/view?/news/2000/12/20/boureax001220
21/Dec/2000 MICHAUD REFUSES TO APOLOGIZE
Yves Michaud, the controversial man who wants to become a candidate for
the Parti Québécois, says premier Bouchard is trying to politically
assassinate him.
21/Dec/2000 Bouchard leadership at stake
By: DON MACPHERSON The Gazette
Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar, Freud said. Sometimes a coincidence is just a coincidence. So maybe it wasn't payback when Bloc Quebecois leader Gilles Duceppe criticized the National Assembly for denouncing Yves Michaud's comments the same day that the Assembly passed the municipal-merger bill that caused Duceppe's party so much trouble in the recent federal election.
Maybe Duceppe wasn't paying a debt to Jacques Parizeau for tirelessly beating the bushes for votes for the Bloc when he took a position on the Yves Michaud affair similar to Parizeau's.
21/Dec/2000 Free speech: view from a poolroom
By: CHARLIE FIDELMAN The Gazette
The Grandbois brothers have never met Yves Michaud and they're not even sure what he said.
But they'll defend the veteran sovereignist's right to speak his mind, no matter what the subject, because that's the "Quebecois way," said actorJean-Marc Grandbois, 38.
21/Dec/2000 The war of words
By: ELIZABETH THOMPSON
The time has come for the Parti Quebecois to decide what it stands for, Premier Lucien Bouchard said yesterday as his showdown with party hard-liners over the Yves Michaud affair continued to escalate.
Ideals and principles are more important than party unity, Bouchard said.
20/Dec/2000 PQ in turmoil
By: ELIZABETH THOMPSON The Gazette; CP contributed to this report
Divisions within Quebec's ruling Parti Quebecois deepened yesterday as Premier Lucien Bouchard said he does not believe veteran sovereignist Yves Michaud should be a candidate for the PQ.
Michaud supporters accused Bouchard of throwing fat on the fire, and said they are beginning to question his leadership.
20/Dec/2000 Take the money and run
By: DON MACPHERSON The Gazette
Our members of the National Assembly have not exactly covered themselves in glory in recent days in their haste to dispose of certain questions.
They've been criticized, and not just by hard-line sovereignists with an axe to grind against Premier Lucien Bouchard, for rushing to judge Yves Michaud for remarks they neglected to identify.
19/Dec/2000 DUMONT SLAMS MICHAUD'S COMMENTS
The leader of L'Action Démocratique, Mario Dumont, says he doesn't agree
with remarks made by an aspiring Parti Québécois candidate about the
Jewish Community. montreal.cbc.ca/cgi-bin/view?/news/2000/12/19/dumont001219
19/Dec/2000 DON'T CENSURE MICHAUD: PARIZEAU
Jacques Parizeau says censuring a Parti Québécois hopeful is setting a
dangerous precedent. The former Quebec premier says the National
Assembly has decreed a man's ideas can be condemned.
FULL STORY: montreal.cbc.ca/cgi-bin/view?/news/2000/12/19/michaudpaz001219
19/Dec/2000 'Dangerous precedent'
By: ELIZABETH THOMPSON The Gazette; PC contributed to this report
The National Assembly made "a grave error" when it adopted a motion last week denouncing comments made by veteran sovereignist Yves Michaud, former Parti Quebecois premier Jacques Parizeau said yesterday.
"It is an extremely dangerous precedent," Parizeau said. "It is the state, through the voice of its parliament, that decrees that the ideas of a man are reprehensible. That must not be accepted in a society."
Yves Michaud and the B’Nai Brith have had a go at each other. While it may be that Michaud used the insult to evade the question. the virtue of which is not an issue, it may just be recurring evidence that the Parti Québecois, in confusing language and culture, continues to divide Quebeckers into convenient, segregated boxes, while welcoming people of totally different cultures, but who speak the French language, as acceptable cultural brothers. There may be a different explanation, which does not appear to be evident to many.
(Editor's Note: since the Wednesday Night discussion, much has transpired including the joint resolution of censure in the National Assembly and Michaud's (quite logical) reaction that the Assembly has no jurisdiction over him as a private citizen. The PQ appears to be in error - could it be the Liberals set them up? Some strategic thinkers believe that federalists should work for Michaud's election. The old theory about the camel and the tent might not prove to be so serendipitous in this case. Certainly this saga will continue.)
15/Dec/2000 Doing the right thing
It was heartening to see the National Assembly yesterday unanimously condemn Yves Michaud, a prominent old-guard member of the Parti Quebecois, for his remarks about ethnic people in general and Jews in particular. Mr. Michaud, a former MNA who is running for the PQ's nomination in a by-election in Mercier riding, richly deserved the legislature's swift condemnation of his statements as categorically "unacceptable."
In a brazen echo of Jacques Parizeau's 1995 referendum-night scapegoating of "money and the ethnic vote," Mr. Michaud told Quebec's estates-general on language this week that the referendum's lopsided No vote in "immigrant" suburbs like Cote St. Luc exemplified how "ethnic votes are against the sovereignty of the Quebec people." Mr. Michaud made a distinction between "Quebecers" and Cote St. Luc residents who, even if he called them immigrants, are generally Canadian-born Jews. He equated "the Quebec people" exclusively with francophones.
19/Dec/2000 MICHAUD WANTS PUBLIC HEARING TO CLEAR HIS NAME
Controversial Parti Québécois member Yves Michaud says he still intends
to seek a seat in the national assembly in spite of widespread criticism
of remarks he made about the Jewish community.
16/Dec/2000 Michaud's mouth
By: DON MACPHERSON The Gazette
In politics, precedents not only serve as guides for subsequent action, they also provide standards against which that action will be compared and judged.
The National Assembly might have created such a precedent on Thursday, when it unanimously passed a motion denouncing opinions expressed by a private citizen.
see Wednesday-Night 980 for more on Yves Michaud and the B’Nai Brith
14/Dec/2000 B'nai Brith feuding with PQ hopeful
By: ELIZABETH THOMPSON The Gazette
Members of B'nai Brith vowed yesterday to campaign against Yves Michaud should he become the Parti Quebecois candidate in the riding of Mercier, saying residents of the multi-cultural area have a right to know more about him.
"We're not going to go door-to door in the riding but we will put out some information, there's no doubt of that," B'nai Brith Canada managing director Robert Libman told reporters.
13/Dec/2000 Premier allows PQ hard-liner's bid for seat
By: PHILIP AUTHIER with files from KEVIN DOUGHERTY
Premier Lucien Bouchard refused yesterday to block the candidacy of a hard-line Michaud who has been denounced by a human-rights organization for remarks he made about Jews in a radio interview last week.
The B'nai Brith League for Human Rights said Yves Michaud, who announced yesterday he would seek the Parti Quebecois nomination in Mercier riding, is an unworthy candidate because he has "railed" against Jews and the B'nai Brith.