Proposed Quebec values charter violates rights, commission says

Provincial government plans to limit religious expression in the workplace

Quebec Premier Pauline Marois. Photo Credit: The Globe and Mail website.

Quebec's Human Rights Commission has ripped into the provincial government's plan to limit religious expression in the workplace, saying the Parti Québécois’s proposed Charter of Quebec Values clearly violates a host of fundamental rights.

Despite the harsh indictment delivered by the province’s rights watchdog Thursday, the PQ minority government vowed to plow ahead with the plan to create a framework for accommodation in Quebec and to impose a ban on religious symbols like veils and turbans in the workplace.

 In a scathing 21-page position paper, the commission said none of the charter of values is necessary and much of it is a clear violation of personal freedoms guaranteed under the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, Quebec’s own charter of rights enacted 38 years ago and international law.

The commission says the government’s proposal confuses basic concepts like the difference between values and rights. The dress code, which is the most controversial element of the proposal is based on evidence that “seems to be more intuitive than rational,” the commission said.

For full story, see The Globe and Mail website.