A slightly off-topic question for the Canadian posters:
What %age of Quebec voters support sovereignity now ?
It has fallen dramatically in recent years and now only about 30-35% would vote Yes in another referendum. The pro-independence Bloc Quebecois was annhilated in the last federal election going from 50 out of 75 Quebec seats in Ottawa to just 4...and then the PQ was crushed in the provincial election election this spring largely because people were afraid they would call another referendum. Its always risky to say "separatism is dead", but the conventional wisdom is that the whole Quebec independence movement is now on life support and is only a past time of an age cohort of baby boomers who associate with with their glory days in the 1970s.
Separatism was supposedly dead at certain points in the early 1990s as well.
One huge difference between the Scottish and Quebec referendums is the question wording. The Scottish wording is very direct, and makes independence clear. Quebec's question was very vague and convoluted.
Oh, I'm sure it wasn't too—
wat
That's nothing compared to the text of the 1980 referendum question:
The Government of Quebec has made public its proposal to negotiate a new agreement with the rest of Canada, based on the equality of nations; this agreement would enable Quebec to acquire the exclusive power to make its laws, levy its taxes and establish relations abroad - in other words, sovereignty - and at the same time to maintain with Canada an economic association including a common currency; any change in political status resulting from these negotiations will only be implemented with popular approval through another referendum; on these terms, do you give the Government of Quebec the mandate to negotiate the proposed agreement between Quebec and Canada?
