By MARIAN SCOTT, KEVIN DOUGHERTY and PHILIP AUTHIER of The Gazette contributed to this report
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Proposed legislation that bans the niqab from government offices, the education system and health care reflects a broad consensus in Quebec that equality of the sexes is paramount, rights experts said yesterday.
But any further step to purge religious symbols from the public sphere would intrude on individual rights, said constitutional lawyer Julius Grey. "We shouldn't follow France into secular radicalism," he said. "I believe that is too dogmatic, and I do not think we should make secularism a religion."
Jack Jedwab, executive director of the Association for Canadian Studies, joined Grey in giving a thumbs-up to Bill 94, tabled Wednesday in the National Assembly. "I think there is a wide consensus in Quebec that if gender equality is paramount, there do seem to be issues around the niqab," he said.
Under the bill, all public sector employees will be required to have their faces uncovered, as will any citizen using government services, for example, someone paying her car registration or applying for a medicare card.
The ban on such face coverings as the niqab or burqa also applies to the entire education sector, from daycare centres to universities, as well as hospitals, public clinics and social services.
However, Jedwab warned that any further restrictions on religious freedom would step on minority rights.
"The government has tried to create a certain benchmark and send a message, but
I don't think it will go a lot further because this is a government that is mindful of rights and freedoms," Jedwab said.
The bill demonstrates that Quebec is more inclined to pass legislation on issues involving minority relations than the rest of Canada, which tends to deal with such issues as religious headgear on a case-by-case basis, Jedwab said.
"They see it as an individual case," he said. "We think of it as a big societal issue."
But Shelina Merani, a spokesperson for Muslim Presence, a network promoting common values based on Islam, charged that the bill is discriminatory and reflects growing anti-Muslim sentiment in Quebec.
"As a woman, you will have to choose between your education and our faith," Merani said in an interview from Ottawa.
"If we want to emancipate women, I think this will do the opposite of what we claim to want to do - it will contribute to ghettoization," she said.
But Grey defended the bill as a reasonable limit on religious expression.
"I am not sympathetic to the niqab and the burqa," he said. "They are equivalent to ghetto walls that a person wears."
The niqab is an opaque face veil with a slit for the eyes. The burqa is a long gown that also covers the face, with a mesh panel through which the wearer peers.
Grey went even further, calling on the government to phase out funding for separate schools for religious and ethnic minorities.
"That is the most common unreasonable accommodation that Quebec makes," he said.
The Parti Québécois opposition has been clamouring for a charter of secularism that would bar civil servants from wearing religious symbols like the hijab (headscarf), kippa (Jewish skullcap) or cross.
But Jedwab warned that such a move would tread on civil rights and would not solve wrangling over accommodation of minorities as proponents claim.
Supporters of strict secularism "create a fiction for people that there are rules and regulations that can govern everything," Jedwab said. "This borders on suppressing religion as an expression of identity."
Morton Weinfeld, a professor of sociology who holds the chair in Canadian ethnic studies at McGill University, had a mixed reaction to the bill.
"What does bother me is the wholesale ban from every
single area of public service and also the idea that a woman cannot request to be served by another woman," he said.
"It seems to me that kind of request could at least be tolerated or considered."
Weinfeld said he personally has no problem with a student wearing a niqab in his classes as long as she participates like the other students.
In Quebec City, the National Assembly's Commission des institutions announced that hearings on Bill 94 will start on May 18.
Any citizen or organization wishing to present a brief to the commission must submit it by May 7, which is also the deadline to register for people wishing to give their opinion, without presenting a brief.
In assembly question period yesterday, Louise Beaudoin of the Parti Québécois asked Justice Minister Kathleen Weil, who tabled Bill 94, whether it would ban the wearing of "ostentatious religious signs" by judges, police, prosecutors or prison guards.
Weil did not answer directly, saying that Bill 94 is based on the "rule of law and on the fact that we are a society that respects not only the Quebec Charter of Rights and Freedoms, but the Canadian charter and all international agreements protecting freedom of conscience and freedom of religion."
Referring to the coming hearings on the bill, Weil added: "We will have the occasion to hear a lot of experts in constitutional law."
In Montreal yesterday, Premier Jean Charest defended the bill, arguing there will not be any need for draconian enforcement measures to make it work.
"We are establishing the principles of what we call reasonable accommodation, which is a concept that has been defined by the Supreme Court of Canada," Charest said at a news conference. "The different departments will have to implement this policy.
"There are directives, and people will just follow the directives that are included. And I expect common sense will prevail.
"There will still be cases of reasonable accommodation. We live in a society of diversity. Nobody expects that to change. What's different today as opposed to yesterday? We are proposing a piece of legislation that sets out criteria, what we call guidelines. We've spoken very directly to the issue of the niqab and the burqa by saying we expect people to deliver and receive services with their face uncovered."
Charest said he hopes the guidelines will help avert a media crisis every time a case comes up.
"I don't think it's a crisis every time," he said. "I think it's normal in our society that these issues appear, and now we are better equipped to be able to address them than before."
Charest said Quebec will live with a policy of open secularism. He challenged the opposition Parti Québécois, which has said Bill 94 is too timid, to spell out what it would do.
Later, an aide to Charest noted the government does not feel it will have to get tough.
"The consequence of not respecting the law is you do not get service," the official said.
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mascot@thegazette.canwest.com