The Speech from the Throne yesterday reiterates a core Canadian value – in the spirit of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, the Royal Commission on Bilingualism and Biculturalism, and the Official Languages Act. The Throne Speech emphasizes that our two official languages are woven into the fabric of our country and reaffirms the federal … Read more
The Quebec Community Groups Network is heartened by an encouraging decision last week from the Court of Appeal in our community’s fight against the imposition of Bill 40. In August, the Quebec English School Boards Association (QESBA) had obtained an injunction from Superior Court suspending application of Bill 40 for English boards until the merits … Read more
The Quebec Community Groups Network is heartened that the province’s highest court upheld a Superior Court stay of proceedings placing the provincial government’s controversial education reform on ice pending a court ruling on the constitutionality of the transformation. The QCGN strongly recommends the Legault government forgo an appeal of the Court of Appeal’s robust ruling, … Read more
The upcoming Throne Speech provides Prime Minister Justin Trudeau with a golden opportunity to make good on a longstanding pledge – and take the final steps needed to modernize the Official Languages Act. Time and circumstances have converged. As Parliament resumes later this month, consensus on how to update the Act has already been achieved. … Read more
As Prime Minister Justin Trudeau prepares his third Throne Speech and a return to Parliament, he has a golden opportunity to make good on his longstanding pledge to modernize the Official Languages Act and fulfill his vision of linguistic duality and strong official language minority communities. Read more
Our community has the Constitutional right to manage and control our schools. The Coalition Avenir Québec government has taken this right away from our English-speaking community – and together we must fight to take back this fundamental right. All nine of our English school boards along with the Quebec English School Boards Association have launched … Read more
By Geoffrey Chambers The focus of most Quebecers remains the pandemic, a safe return of our children to school and the reopening of our economy. However, our government appears to have shifted its focus to language. And as it does so, it is once again minimizing the importance of the contributions to this province by … Read more
Rather than picking fights with our community, we urge the Legault government to alter course, work with us, and cease defining us as a problem, writes QCGN President Geoffrey Chambers in this opinion piece for The Gazette. Chambers argues that today’s English-speaking community is invested in Quebec. We have encouraged and enabled our children to … Read more
Quebec Superior Court has granted a stay to English school boards challenging a provincial government law abolishing them, pending the outcome of a legal challenge on its merits. The province passed the law — known as Bill 40 — in February, abolishing school boards and replacing them with service centres, eliminating school board elections for … Read more
A Quebec Superior Court judge has ruled in favour of the Quebec English School Boards Association (QESBA) request for a stay on Bill 40, the law that abolishes school boards and replaces them with service centres. “We are very pleased with the decision today which has the effect of suspending the application of Bill 40 … Read more
Quebec’s English School boards will remain as they are after the province’s superior court judged in favour on a stay of Bill 40 on Monday. The Quebec English School Board Association (QESBA) is applauding the court’s judgment on the education reform bill, a legislation that abolishes boards across the province and replaces them with service … Read more
Quebec’s plan to change English school boards into service centres has been put on ice temporarily after a Quebec Superior Court justice ruled that the plan raised “very serious questions” pertaining to the constitutionality of Bill 40. Justice Sylvain Lussier also ruled that the disappearance of English-language school boards (and their transformation into English-language school … Read more