By MARIAN SCOTT - It's right up there in Chapter One, Article One of the city's charter: "Montreal is a French-speaking city."
But as just about anyone can tell you, the fact is that Montreal is bilingual. At least, that is the overwhelming conclusion of a survey last week for the Association of Canadian Studies.
Eighty per cent of Quebecers agree with the statement: "Montreal is a bilingual city," while 17 per cent disagree and three per cent don't know.
What's more, a solid majority of Quebecers say Montreal should be bilingual. Seventy per cent of respondents disagree with the statement: "Montreal should not be a bilingual city."
The results show the average Quebecer is far more comfortable with the city's bilingual character than are most politicians, said Jack Jedwab, executive director of the nonprofit association.
"Our officials have been reluctant to make the statement of fact that Montreal is a bilingual city," Jedwab said. "I think the poll is very helpful in showing that there is a consensus around the acknowledgment that Montreal is bilingual." Jedwab added the poll should encourage elected officials to come out and publicly declare that the city is bilingual.
Protecting Montreal's French "face" is a popular concern among politicians. Some demographers sounded an alarm when the 2006 census showed that the number of mother-tongue francophones dipped to just under 50 per cent on the island of Montreal. Last year, Parti Quebecois language critic Pierre Curzi issued a study claiming "to establish without a doubt the alarming increase of English."
But Jedwab said worries over the preservation of French are no reason to deny the city's linguistic reality. "It's not a solution to pretend that Montreal is something that it isn't," he said.
According to the 2006 census, 17.4 per cent of the 3.3 million Montrealarea residents speak English most often at home, 69.1 per cent speak French most often and 13.4 per cent speak another language.
Allophones are most likely to say that Montreal is bilingual, with 67.5 per cent saying they strongly agree the city is bilingual and 26.3 per cent saying they somewhat agree. Among anglophones, 52.4 per cent strongly agree that Montreal is bilingual while 36.6 per cent somewhat agree. Among francophones, 37 per cent strongly agree while 41.7 per cent somewhat agree.
Montrealers are more likely than people in other regions to think the city should be bilingual.
In the Montreal area, 76.5 per cent of respondents disagreed with the statement, "Montreal should not be a bilingual city," while 64.9 per cent of Quebec City residents and 63.2 per cent of those in other parts of Quebec disagreed.
While multiculturalism has come under fire in Quebec's political circles, 95 per cent of Quebecers also say the city is multicultural -a consensus that transcends all regions and age groups, the survey showed.
Leger Marketing polled 1,000 Quebecers in the online survey during the week of Jan 24. An equivalent telephone survey would be accurate within 2.9 percentage points, 19 times out of 20.
mascot@montrealgazette.com