My own private youth summit

>> Why the PQ didn't invite many youth organizations to its much-vaunted round table on young people

by PHILIP PREVILLE

A summit on Quebec's youth! For, by, and about young people! The leaders of tomorrow! Time for them to make themselves heard! Time for the rest of us to hear what they have to say!

If only. The provincial government's much-vaunted Youth Summit (the Sommet du Quebec et de la jeunesse, to be exact) will be held in Quebec City next week--but the list of Summit invitees reads more like a who's who of aging greybeards.

Among the renowned "youth" organizations who will help decide the future direction of Quebec's young people: the Conseil du patronat (Quebec's largest business lobby group), the Quebec Chamber of Commerce (but not the Young Chamber of Commerce), every big union in the province (hardly bastions of sprightly exuberance), numerous bank presidents (youth's favourite contemporary role models?) and the Union of Agricultural Producers (farming being a popular career choice for Gen-Xers?).

All told, of the 40-plus organizations invited to participate in the Summit, only 11 could rightfully be considered "youth organizations." By contrast, the list of youth organizations that weren't invited is far longer. And they think there's one key reason why they've been left out.

"We weren't invited because we've been critical of the PQ's education agenda," says President Rob Green of the Concordia Students' Union, which is a member of the politically radical (relatively speaking) Canadian Federation of Students (CFS). "The Summit has been set up to act as a rubber-stamp for the PQ's plan to privatize the education system." Other organizations left out out the summit include the Mouvement pour le Droit a l'Education (MDE, which organized numerous student protests and occupations last fall) and the Regroupement Autonome des Jeunes (RAJ).

Now a new umbrella youth group has been born: CAP Jeunesse, whose only purpose in life is to oppose the Youth Summit. Says CAP Jeunesse organizer Eric Fontaine: "The PQ is going to come out of that Summit with its own recommendations and say, 'We must act in the name of our youth.' We refuse to let them get away with it."
Student politics run amok?

But Simon Begin, a spokesperson for the Summit, puts a different spin on the decision to leave those organizations out in the cold. "We chose our invitees based on how many people they represent or how many members they have," Begin says. "We need people who will speak for the majority and who will work with the government."

In veiled language, Begin also takes a shot at youth organizations that seem to be against everything. "The MDE came out and brazenly announced that they were 'boycotting' the Summit. But how can you boycott something when you haven't been invited in the first place?"

Indeed, had the PQ invited every student organization in Quebec, it's easy to imagine the Summit degenerating into one of those nightmarish student-politics boondoggles: endless procedural wranglings, groups walking out in protest and moderators flipping frantically through dog-eared copies of Robert's Rules of Order.

With a laugh, Concordia's Green admits there's some truth to the student-politics stereotype. Still, he says, "There should be some dissent at the table. They want to be able to come out of the Summit with unanimous approval for their agenda, and that's why they've left us out."

The Youth Summit takes place February 22-24 in Quebec City. CAP Jeunesse and its member organizations will also be in Quebec City, holding their own alternative summit over the same three days. :

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