The Quebec government has tabled new legislation that would expand the province’s religious symbols ban to all school staff.
Introduced Thursday, the bill would prohibit anyone who works in schools or around students from wearing religious symbols on the job. The ban would also extend to people who are not school employees but who regularly offer services to students, such as volunteers at a school library.
Quebec’s legislation would be a significant expansion of the province’s existing religious symbols ban, which currently applies only to public employees in positions of authority, such as teachers and police officers. The bill would update the province’s Education Act, and also require students and staff to have their faces uncovered at school.
The Quebec government has invoked the notwithstanding clause of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms to shield the bill from constitutional challenges, as it did with the secularism law, known as Bill 21, that first imposed a ban on religious symbols.
As well, the legislation would require teachers to submit educational plans to school principals, who would have to evaluate teachers annually. And it would further expand the requirement for employees at French-language schools to speak only in French with students and staff.
Education Minister Bernard Drainville has for months promised legislation to strengthen secularism in schools following a controversy over reports of religious practices at several of the province’s public schools.
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Last October, a government report found that a group of teachers at Bedford elementary school in Montreal had imposed autocratic rule at the school. It found that teachers yelled at and humiliated students. Subjects like science and sex education were either ignored or barely taught, and girls were prevented from playing soccer.
Since then, the government has investigated more than a dozen other public schools over allegations of religious practices. The investigation found few breaches of the province’s secularism rules, but suggested the government review the list of employees covered by the religious symbols ban.
