Quebec language office pressed transit agency for months before Habs playoff run

Quebec's language watchdog contacted the Montreal transit agency at least six times over a complaint about using the word "go" on city buses to cheer on a local soccer team. 

Quebec’s language watchdog contacted the Montreal transit agency at least six times in the wake of a complaint about using the word “go” on city buses to cheer on a local soccer team.

The watchdog — the Office québécois de la langue française — asked for multiple updates on the agency’s efforts to remove the word, and kept the complaint open for nine months until “go” had been scrubbed from more than 1,000 city buses in Montreal, according to emails obtained by The Canadian Press.

The correspondence contrasts with the office’s public comments responding to an April report in the Montreal Gazette that revealed how the transit agency had replaced the expression “Go! Canadiens Go!” on its buses with “Allez! Canadiens Allez!” to appease the watchdog.

The news report, coinciding with the Montreal Canadiens’ first home game of the Stanley Cup playoffs, prompted a public outcry and elicited a declaration from French-language Minister Jean-François Roberge in support of the expression “Go Habs Go!”

At that time, the watchdog said it had “contacted the (transit agency) to inform it of the complaint and remind it of its obligations under the (French-language) charter.” But the office didn’t share details about the length of its review and the number of times it pressed transit officials for updates.

The internal correspondence reveals how an adviser for the language office sent at least six emails to the transit agency between May 2024 and January 2025, informing the agency of a complaint and asking about its plans to fix the problem. The documents were obtained under access-to-information law.

The complaint, received on April 29, 2024, related to city buses displaying the expression “Go! CF Mtl Go!” – a reference to Montreal’s professional soccer club.

The transit agency initially responded to the language office in June 2024, explaining that such slogans give bus drivers “a way to salute national sports teams.”