Restricting the use of the derogation provision would be a “very, very, very bad idea”, believes the Minister responsible for Secularism, Jean-François Roberge, who proposed on Thursday to protect “Law 21” for another five years.
The CAQ minister tabled a bill in the morning “allowing the Parliament of Quebec to preserve the principle of parliamentary sovereignty with regard to the Law on State Secularism.” The legislative text consists of only two articles and ensures that the exemption provision is renewed for another cycle.
In a decision rendered in 2021, the Superior Court of Quebec mainly upheld the law on religious neutrality, adopted in 2019, arguing that the override provision obliged it to do so.
Jean-François Roberge affirms that “Bill 21” is “an extremely important achievement” for Quebec. “It preserves, at the moment, social peace, it promotes living together. This is why we absolutely must renew the exemption clause,” he said in the press scrum before rushing to the Salon Bleu to submit his bill.
In his farewell speech in Ottawa, former federal Justice Minister Lametti David Lametti raised the idea of preventing the preventive use of the notwithstanding provision. ” At a certain time […], we must understand that constitutional change will be necessary. And we must prepare for that,” he said, attacking the use of these articles of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms in the CAQ law reforming the Charter of the French language.
The next day, the Quebec lieutenant of Justin Trudeau’s government, Pablo Rodriguez, agreed that “many members of the caucus [libéral] share this point of view.
Questioned on this subject, Minister Roberge wanted to issue a warning to the federal government on Thursday. “That would be a very, very, very, bad idea,” he argued. “ [La disposition de dérogation] is part of the balance. Balance in Canada is extremely important. »
“To defend the Quebec model, we must be able to defend collective rights. It is good to defend individual rights, but there are also collective rights, and the notwithstanding clause allows us to do so,” he added.
Further details will follow.