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Quebecers have displayed confusion about how secession could be achieved in Quebec

Other separatist leaders followed the same line. Bloc Québécois leader Martine Ouellet, who was in Barcelona for the referendum, tweeted her disgust at the “deafening silence” of the Canadian government. Her party tried unsuccessfully to introduce a motion in the House of Commons to condemn the Spanish government’s “violent repression.”

And the left-wing separatist party Québec Solidaire tried to introduce a motion in the National Assembly that would have recognized Catalonia’s eventual independence. It failed to get sufficient votes to be accepted for debate.

And what about the “federalist” Liberal Party of Quebec, led by Premier Philippe Couillard? He chooses federalism, yet maintains that Quebec has an unfettered right to secede should Quebecers so choose, because Quebec is a nation.

Couillard refuses to recognize the legitimacy of the 1982 Constitution Act

On June 1, 2017, with great fanfare, the premier released a 177-page document detailing his party’s new constitutional policy. Titled Quebecers: Our way of being Canadian,it contained three passages that claimed Quebec is free to choose any status. It notes, for instance, that “Quebec is free to make its choices and able to take control of its destiny and its development. Quebec possesses all the characteristics of a nation and recognizes itself as such.”

The document also refuses to recognize the legitimacy of the 1982 Constitution Act, which patriated Canada’s constitution and entrenched the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. That act, which was supported by nine provinces and fulfilled the conditions set out by the Supreme Court of Canada, was rejected at the time by premier René Lévesque, and has been rejected by every Quebec premier since. Keeping with this tradition, Couillard’s document affirms the Quebec government’s continued opposition to the Constitution Act of 1982.