muslos2424

Two news segments from April and September 1981; the first concerns a coalition attempt by all the provincial leaders except Bill Davis and Richard Hatfield (British Columbia, Alberta, Saskatchewan, Manitoba, Quebec, Nova Scotia, Prince Edward Island and Newfoundland), to take control of the constitutional renewal process from the federal government. Following his unexpected but successful return to power in early 1980, and his defeat of Rene Levesque and his Parti Quebecois government referendum on the question of Quebec's sovereignty and association with the rest of Canada, Pierre Trudeau once again, as he had many times over the years as prime minister, attempted work towards an agreement with the rest of the first ministers on patriation; when this latest attempt again came to nothing, Trudeau did something no prime minister before him had considered: he made a declaration to bring home the BNA Act unilaterally, without provincial consent - he would include an amending formula and also ground a charter of rights in the fundamental document; and this is what spurred the creation of the Gang of Eight, who variously took Ottawa to court over this position until the case went up to the consideration of the Supreme Court of Canada, which in late September of 1981 judged that though the prime minister was technically within his authority to take such action, to do so would be a contradiction of the tradition of compromise and common grounds found between the prime minister and premiers of Canada since the time of Laurier.

So with all this around them, on November 5th 1981 nine provincial leaders and prime minister Trudeau finally came to agreement, a feat that had eluded first ministers in Canada for more than fifty years, in what was generally considered to be the last effort for a long time to reach a deal on the constitution.

April 15th 1980 - coming to the end of its mandate to govern, Rene Levesque and the Parti Quebecois announce the date and details of their referendum to empower them to negotiate anew the relationship between the nation of Quebec and the rest of Canada. In the House of Commons in Ottawa, prime minister Trudeau declares that even with a win for the Levesque side, it would be a theoretical contradiction for the federal government to accept the legitimacy of such a basis for such negotiations; short of taking extra-legal measures, Quebec can only ever negotiate with the federal government as a province of Canada.

May 14 1980 - Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau gives one last speech for the Non side in the first referendum in Quebec on negotiating sovereignty-association with Canada.