Sylvain Simard

Sylvain Simard (born April 26, 1945) is a politician and academic based in the Canadian province of Quebec.

He holds a Bachelor of Arts degree in Education from the Université de Montréal (1967), a Master of Arts degree from McGill University (1970), and a Ph.D. in Comparative Literature from the University of Bordeaux in France (1975).

From 1976 to 1994, he was a professor of French literature at the University of Ottawa.

He was elected as the PQ's vice-president in 1981 and argued that the party's internal organization should receive more autonomy from the provincial PQ government of René Lévesque.

In 1982, he helped organize a street protest against Canadian prime minister Pierre Trudeau's patriation of the Canadian Constitution without Quebec's approval.

Later in the same year, he requested that Elections Canada incorporate a federal wing of the PQ so that the party could run candidates in the next Canadian federal election.

Some senior party members opposed this measure, which led to the creation of the Parti nationaliste du Québec.

Simard also helped coordinate the PQ's bid to join the Socialist International in 1983.

This was opposed by the New Democratic Party, then the leading social democratic party in the rest of Canada outside Quebec.

Simard supported electoral reform and proposed that future elections in Quebec be conducted under a system of compensatory proportional representation.

He also encouraged Premier Levesque to shuffle his cabinet and staff in early 1984, arguing that some people had been in the same positions for too long.

His own term as vice-president ended in 1984.

He completed a work entitled Mythe et reflet de la France: L'image du Canada en France in 1987, examining perceptions of Quebec in France from the time of Louis Napoleon to World War I.

He also formed a group called the Gatineau Democratic Movement in 1987, and there was some speculation that he would run for mayor in that year's municipal election.

He ultimately decided against doing so, arguing that it would be irresponsible to split the vote against incumbent Gaétan Cousineau.

Simard was encouraged to run as a New Democratic Party candidate in the 1988 federal election, at a time when the NDP was seeking to build its support base in Quebec.

He ultimately decided against running.

In the same period, Simard became involved with local politics in the Outaouais region.

He was a prominent local member of the Société nationale des Québécois and opposed proposed changes to the province's Charter of the French Language.

Cousineau was narrowly re-elected to the mayoralty, but resigned from office in early 1988.

Simard was the first declared candidate in a by-election to succeed him, running on a platform of increased democratic consultation, budget cuts that would not affect municipal salaries, and reduced taxes.

He also argued that Gatineau residents should be allowed to have a referendum on a proposed cultural centre, called for all mayoral candidates to declare their financial interests, and proposed a new municipal code of ethics.

On election day, he lost to Bob Labine by only 174 votes.

Simard was a PQ candidate in the 1989 provincial election, narrowly losing to Liberal Party cabinet minister Guy Rivard in the Montreal division of Rosemont.

From 1990 to 1994, Simard was president of the Mouvement National des Quebecois (MNQ).

In 1991, he argued that a sovereign Quebec would try to reduce the concentration of immigrant communities in Montreal neighbourhoods.

He was quoted as saying, "We can't lower the concentration [of existing communities]; the people who are here are here. But in the future . . . we will have to adjust our welcome of immigrants to our capacities to integrate them."

He also argued that francophone Quebecers would need to become more accepting of immigrants and the changes they would bring to Quebec culture.

At a MNQ meeting in May 1991, he said that most francophone Quebecers were "remarkably open to the necessity for and the advantages of immigration."

As MNQ president, Simard argued that francophone Quebecers were unfairly singled out by Canadian federalists for having condoned racist and xenophobic behaviour in earlier times.

In the wake of a public controversy over Esther Delisle's The Traitor and the Jew, which addressed historical anti-Semitism and Quebec nationalism, Simard said, "Of course we denounce all forms of anti-Semitism and xenophobia, and we don't excuse it even fifty years later. But why should we have to respond to [...] attacks that are obviously politically motivated?"

Unlike other Quebec sovereigntist groups, the MNQ under Simard's leadership sought to build links with francophone groups across Canada.

Simard called for a referendum on sovereignty in early 1992 and campaigned against the Charlottetown Accord on Canadian constitutional reform later in the same year.

He represented Richelieu in the National Assembly of Quebec from 1994 to 2012, and was a cabinet minister in the governments of Lucien Bouchard and Bernard Landry.

Simard is a member of the Parti Québécois (PQ).

Simard was born in Chicoutimi, Quebec.

Simard was first elected to the National Assembly of Quebec for Richelieu in the 1994 provincial election, defeating Liberal incumbent Albert Khelfa.

The PQ won a majority government in this election under Jacques Parizeau's leadership, and Simard entered the legislature as a government backbencher.

Simard's brother, Christian Simard, was a Bloc Québécois member of the House of Commons of Canada from 2004 to 2006.

Simard first became involved with the Parti Québécois as a regional organizer in the Outaouais.