Translating the printemps érable

The Canadian Press                 June 18, 2012

Original French Text: http://www.ledevoir.com/politique/quebec/352761/conflit-etudiant-la-fecq-lance-un-troisieme-appel-a-la-mediation

FECQ president Éliane Laberge thinks that mediation, a process that has “stood the test of time,” would allow all parties to come together and arrive at a satisfactory compromise.

Today, the Fédération étudiante collégiale du Québec (FECQ) made a third appeal to the Charest government to accept mediation. In their view, it is the only way to resolve the conflict that has persisted for several months between students and the Quebec government. 

The FECQ had already made similar appeals on the 1st and the 23 of May, when private letters were sent to Premier Jean Charest and Education Minister Michelle Courchesne.

Given the failure of the last two attempts—the government did not respond to the letters—the FECQ decided to make its intentions public. 

Today, Premier Jean Charest said he wanted to know on what bases the FECQ was proposing to negotiate.

“We would like to know what the FECQ’s position is, because the government has made several efforts since the beginning of the conflict, such as extending the period of the tuition increase, setting up a loan repayment scheme based on income, and improving the loans and bursaries program. There has been no flexibility on the part of the students,” stated the Premier from Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, where he is taking part in the United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development 

“Of course I am open to negotiations, but they still have to tell us on what bases they want to negotiate, otherwise we’ll just end up back where we started,” added the Premier.

Reconciliation

FECQ president Éliane Laberge thinks that mediation, a process that has “stood the test of time,” would allow all parties to come together and arrive at a satisfactory compromise.

She hopes that mediation will put an end to this crisis and allow students to return to class in August. 

A few hours after the FECQ’s announcement, Michel Arsenault, president of the Fédération des travailleurs et travailleuses du Québec (FTQ), appealed to the Quebec government to seize the opportunity and accept the students’ call for mediation. 

He considers the FECQ’s request proof of the students’ “genuine desire to resolve the conflict” adding that, the government’s acceptance would show that “they are also committed to ending the crisis.” 

To ensure neutrality, Laberge explained that the FECQ was considering asking the Juripop legal clinic, working under the Québec Bar association, to handle the case and be in charge of organizing the mediation. Another option would be the Institut de médiation et d’arbitrage du Québec.

“Stop making videos”

Ms. Laberge can’t imagine any other way of ending the conflict. She says that she sincerely hopes the government will “accept its responsibilities” and chose to participate in the mediation process “in good faith.” 

“The government, Mr. Charest in particular, should spend less time making commercials with taxpayers’ money,” she said, referring to the recently aired Quebec Liberal Party television ad.

“Stop making videos and agree to meet with students and a mediator,” she added.  

In his video, Charest talks about making responsible decisions “regardless of the pressures.” However, Laberge has a different take on it. 

“A responsible government doesn’t let a crisis like this drag on for four months,” she said. 

The FECQ plans to continue mobilizing and the idea of suspending protest activities is clearly not an option for the president. The FECQ has several demonstrations planned throughout Quebec in the coming days.

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Translated from the original French byTranslating the printemps érable.

*Translating the printemps érable is a volunteer collective attempting to balance the English media’s extremely poor coverage of the student conflict in Québec by translating media that has been published in French into English. These are amateur translations; we have done our best to translate these pieces fairly and coherently, but the final texts may still leave something to be desired. If you find any important errors in any of these texts, we would be very grateful if you would share them with us at translatingtheprintempsderable@gmail.com. Please read and distribute these texts in the spirit in which they were intended; that of solidarity and the sharing of information.