The Parti Québécois is doubling down on secularism after Bedford saga

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OTTAWA — Parti Québécois Leader Paul St-Pierre Plamondon said he believes there is “religious infiltration” and “Islamist infiltration” in Quebec schools in the wake of a sprawling controversy about a Montreal school where teachers were accused of creating a climate of terror.

According to the separatist leader, the inaction of teachers, unions and school boards in the face of acts of indoctrination of children in classrooms should lead to a tightening of secularism in the province.

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“Clearly there is a discomfort in intervening or discussing these religious questions very frankly and for me, this is not unrelated to the very Canadian anti-secularism discourse,” said St-Pierre Plamondon in an interview with the National Post on Thursday.

He said Quebec is facing a case of “ideological infiltration,” “anti-secularism and anti-Bill 21 activism” that has been plaguing some education professionals for years.

“The federal government is truly the champion of defamation of Quebec’s secularism, which is no stranger to the woke movement that presents secularism as a form of racism when it is actually a form of living together in peace,” he added.

The man known as PSPP made headlines in Quebec this week after his controversial comments about “religious entryism” following a scattered report by the Quebec Ministry of Education on the “toxic environment” at Montreal’s Bedford School.

The Montreal elementary school is garnering all the attention in a province embroiled in a heated debate over secularism. For years, Bill 21, or the State Secularism Act, has divided the province’s minorities and French-speaking majority.

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Adopted by the National Assembly in 2019, the law, which uses the Constitution’s notwithstanding clause to shield the government from legal challenges, prohibits the wearing of religious symbols by certain people in positions of authority, including teachers and principals of public elementary and secondary schools.

However, the law does not seek to introduce the notion of secularism more specifically in other areas such as education, said Marc Chevrier, a professor of political science at the Université du Québec à Montréal. “Moreover, if you read the Education Act, you will find no mention of secularism or secular education anywhere,” he says.

St-Pierre Plamondon said Quebec must do more in terms of secularism in our schools to protect children “from all religious proselytism” and “ensure the duty of neutrality of teachers, which must be applied to all manifestations of religious beliefs, regardless of religion.”

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The Bedford affair is another example of the divisions between religious minorities and the majority. It began with disagreements between teachers and is now a national debate on welcoming immigrants to Quebec and the place of religion in schools.

Internal debates between teachers on the use of foreign languages in common areas, acts of violence against children and clashing teaching methods pushed the education minister to suspend 11 teachers while an investigation is underway. The premier also asked two of his ministers to look into more measures to strengthen secularism in schools.

According to a report from the Quebec Ministry of Education, a “dominant clan” composed in particular of North African teachers attempted to indoctrinate children and maintained a “clan” dynamic among staff since 2017.

Some teachers did not teach science, ethics and sex education, adopted traditional and rigid methods and some shouted at students to discipline them.

The report also mentions that “an act of violence was reported to the administration when a teacher allegedly closed the door to his classroom with a brutal gesture while one of his students had her fingers on the door frame.” The student was allegedly saved by another individual just in time.

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In addition, government investigators discovered that the local Muslim community exerted a “strong influence” within the Bedford school.

Some teachers prayed mainly during their free time in classrooms or performed their ablutions in communal toilets, according to the ministry’s report. In rare cases, the report states, these practices were carried out in front of students.

Since then, the school in the highly multicultural Côte-des-Neiges neighbourhood has been at the centre of a political hurricane.

Muslim parents with children at the school told the Montreal Gazette they fear the suspensions will fuel political discourse. It did.

The premier described the situation in Bedford as a group of teachers trying to “introduce Islamic religious concepts” into a public school.

“In Quebec, we decided a long time ago to remove religion from public schools. We will never accept going back,” Quebec Premier François Legault said.

But the PSPP’s comments about “religious entryism” have taken the debate to a whole new level. Especially when the PQ has announced its intention to impose a moratorium on permanent immigration from outside Quebec if it comes to power in the 2026 election.

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The debate around the Bedford School has become so toxic that Quebec Muslims say they feel like they are being treated as second-class citizens by their government and many in the political class.

“Obviously, if it comes out that there was a concerted effort to conspire, to impose your own religious values on others or on a public institution, of course that’s unacceptable. But the report doesn’t conclude that,” said Stephen Brown, the CEO of the National Council of Canadian Muslims.

In Ottawa, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s Quebec lieutenant, Jean-Yves Duclos, told reporters that it was up to the Quebec government to see what needs to be done to protect Quebec students. “That’s the jurisdiction of the Quebec government,” he said.

Education Minister Bernard Drainville has launched a formal investigation into the behaviour of the 11 teachers and audits will also be conducted at three other schools in the Centre de services scolaire de Montréal. But politicians haven’t waited for the results of the investigation to give their opinion.

Brown believes that if politicians can’t conclusively state that people are plotting to impose their ideology on a public institution before an independent investigation is complete, “it reeks of political opportunism.”

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“Being visibly Muslim is seen somehow as threatening. That’s a real social problem. And politicians should not be pandering or exacerbating fears around diversity,” he said.

Chevrier said that generally speaking, and regardless of religion, it is in the interest of any politician not to blow up the relationship between the state and a particular religious community if they want a calm debate.

“But we must not be afraid of the facts either. I think that the important thing in these matters is also to base our decisions on facts without making hasty or overly generalized judgments,” said Chevrier.

In the case of the Bedford school, Islamism was mentioned, but other examples have also emerged at Jewish schools and Catholic schools.

This week, the Parti Québécois, the Quebec Liberal Party and Québec solidaire all voted in favour of a motion calling on the Coalition avenir Québec to stop funding private denominational schools. The government sends $160 million every year to about 50 such schools, which are predominantly Catholic. The CAQ government voted against it, even though it presents itself as a champion of secularism.

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Paul St-Pierre Plamondon believes that the government is failing Quebecers of all faiths and especially children in school by not sufficiently tightening the principles of secularism.

“The issue here is how to manage our schools to make room for all families who have very different perspectives on this subject. And the only solution is to not let religion enter our school system,” said St-Pierre Plamondon. “So I can’t help but talk about religion in the school system.”

National Post
atrepanier@postmedia.com

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