Minority communities in Canada's Quebec slam 'discriminatory' secularism law: 'I feel alienated'

A recent ruling by the top court in Canada's Quebec province upholding a law barring people from wearing religious symbols at public workplaces has enraged the minority community that denounced the policy as "discriminatory".

Amrit Kaur, one of multiple petitioners that challenged the secularism legislation introduced in 2019, accused the regional administration of abandoning its residents.

"It felt like a betrayal by the government, who refused to accept its own people," Kaur said.

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"I was suddenly not a Quebecer any more if I wanted to work at any public workplace while wearing my religious symbols," added the devout Sikh, who dons a turban and the kada (sacred bangle).

The 33-year-old was forced to leave her hometown Montreal, where she lived since her childhood, to take up a teaching job in a state-run school in British Columbia, about 4,000km (2,500 miles) away.

Kaur also said the law, popularly known as Bill 21, made her feel "alienated" in the French-speaking region that has a population of 8.5 million people.

The measure prevents workers in positions of authority including principals, vice-principals and teachers at public educational institutions, police officers, government lawyers, arbitrators, and peace officers from wearing any religious symbols such as hijabs (headscarves), cross necklaces, turbans and yarmulkes, among others.

The law does not apply to those who were hired before it was enacted.

Last month, Quebec's Court Of Appeal refused to quash the law, sparking outrage from thousands of Muslims, Jews and Sikhs in the province.

Quebec chapter of World Sikh Organisation of Canada spokeswoman Harginder Kaur said the rule targeted Sikhs, Muslims, Jews, and other communities with faith, "effectively" by excluding them from teaching, law enforcement and other public service roles.

"The court's decision undermines fundamental human rights and the principle of freedom of religion and sets a troubling precedent for the treatment of communities of faith across the country," she said.

In a 2022 survey, 60 per cent of Jewish respondents said their sense of being accepted as a "full-fledged member of Quebec society" had deteriorated ever since the law was initiated in 2019. The poll also found that 78 per cent of Muslim women expressed the same view.

The non-profit National Council of Canadian Muslims, another petitioner in the case, called the law "discriminatory".

Montreal-based public policy scholar Benoit Pelletier partly echoed that view while looking at it from the perspective of minority women, but said people must understand that no right or liberty was "absolute" in nature.

Pelletier, who testified before a Superior Court in favour of the law in 2020, said the "collective interest" of Quebecers had been considered while imposing it.

Although the rights and freedoms of religion were guaranteed under the constitution's Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, these were subjected to limits prescribed by law as can be demonstrably justified in a free and democratic society, the former Liberal member of Quebec's National Assembly said.

Experts, however, argued that the charter analysis stated if the court determined that a law, policy or government action infringed a charter right, the court must consider whether such a breach was being demonstrably justified in a free and democratic society.

But the government had used the charter's notwithstanding clause, which shields legislation from the judiciary's scrutiny.

Quebec's Ministry of Executive Council spokesperson told This Week In Asia that the National Assembly adopted the law respecting the "Laicite of the State".

It maintained that the legislation affirmed the following four principles upon which the Quebec model of Laicite of the State hinged: separation of state and religions; religious neutrality of the state; equality of all citizens; and freedom of conscience and freedom of religion.

The spokesperson added the Quebec model of laicite (secularism in French) allows creation of a neutral, common space for religions, and unambiguously asserts that the territory is a state for all Quebecers, regardless of their religious affiliation or convictions.

Another petitioner, the Canadian Civil Liberties Association (CCLA) said the government should not be allowed to dictate its terms to the people of Quebec.

"Women who choose to wear religious scarves, hats, and turbans should also have a right to freedom of expression and religion, and to make their own choices without government interference like others in Canada," Noa Mendelsohn Aviv, the non-profit's executive director and general counsel, said.

A Superior Court in 2021 exempted Quebec's largest English public school board, the English Montreal School Board (EMSB) that has 5,000 staff members spread over 60 institutions, from the law.

But the Court of Appeal revoked that order last month.

The chairman of EMSB, Quebec's largest English public school board, said there was no evidence of teachers wearing religious symbols had any adverse effect on the quality of education.

Joe Ortona also said this law could mean "our schools would miss out on the real talent" amid a shortage of teachers.

Amrit Kaur, CCLA and other appellants are exploring legal options to challenge the Court of Appeal's judgment at the Supreme Court.

She said the government never discussed the law with the minority groups before proposing it, and its interaction was limited to francophone sociologists and educationists, who fear "immigrants" will "take over" Quebec.

Historically inhabited by subarctic indigenous people, Quebec was claimed by France in 1534, and then colonised by the British in 1763.

One initial push for French civic Republicanism - which is the basis for Quebec's laicite - came in 1838, when all ties between church and state were abolished. In 1867, the new Canadian federal constitution did not refer to God thus implicitly introducing an advanced system of religious neutrality.

During the Quiet Revolution in 1960-70, the state took over education, health and social services sectors that were earlier controlled by the church.

As racial discrimination was eliminated from Canada's immigration policy in the 1960s, non-European immigrants, including Muslims from former French colonies, such as Algeria, Morocco and Lebanon came to Quebec, as opposed to the previous arrivals of Christians, Jewish and Sikhs from European countries and the UK between 1850-1950s.

In 1969, Quebec ensured that immigrants learn French. By the 1980s, it called for the preservation of French linguistic and cultural identity while rejecting Canada's multiculturalism.

While no single culture holds more sway over Canada's multiculturalism ex-lawmaker Pelletier explained the "pluralistic" and "diverse" Quebec believes in interculturalism, where a principal culture - enriched by the contribution of all - aboriginals, francophones, Anglophones, and any other set of immigrants from Ireland, the UK, South America and Africa - dominates.

A Ministry of Executive Council spokesperson said that Quebec's intercultural approach is a "cohabitation model that promotes a shared commitment between the host society and immigrants".

The official added that the government is fostering a "multifaceted" and "dynamic" Quebec identity while ensuring "social cohesion centred on French (Quebec's official language) and the region's values of respect for individual rights and freedoms, democracy, the rule of law, gender equality, and the Laicite of the State".

Guillaume Rousseau from the Mouvement laique Quebecois, a non-profit that intervened in the trial to support the Quebec government, said Quebec has the lowest rate of hate crime - 5.1 incidents per 100,000 inhabitants- among all Canadian provinces.

Rousseau added that the francophone Quebec culture that welcomes everyone insists on uniting people and not dividing them but it requires more efforts from immigrants than it is required in multiculturalism.

Kaur, who never discusses religion at her workplace, said the province disowned her despite her fluent French and love for Quebec's top ice hockey team Montreal Canadiens - all things that make her a true Quebecer.

"I am fighting for my rights as an ordinary Quebecer and a devout Sikh," she said. "Both believe in peaceful coexistence."

This article originally appeared on the South China Morning Post (SCMP).

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