Signes religieux: Pauline Marois sur la défensive – and Other Charter Articles

Further to my earlier post (Question du voile: «On a plus urgent»), on the record of PQ ministers, and previous PQ governments favouring inclusion and openness on religious symbols (when PM Marois was education minister), fun to see lively debate in the Quebec legislature pointing out the contradictions with the approach in the charter.

And like so many politicians these days, she takes what I can only call the “stupid” approach of denying the shift, rather than being honest and having a discussion on why the change. Even if I don’t agree with the Charter, any good comms person or policy advisor to come up with a few talking points that would sound more credible than:

«Jamais, jamais, dans ce document (the 1988 policy document), nous ne parlons de signes ostensibles. Jamais, parce que, dans les faits, comme je suis très cohérente, ce n’était pas dans ce document, puisque dans la charte nous empêcherons qu’il y ait le port de signes religieux ostensibles, et cela va dans le sens du respect, de chacun et de tous et de toutes», a argué la première ministre.

The more the PQ speaks of coherence, the more incoherent it appears.

And the polls do not appear to show that the political gambit of the Charter has worked; the PLQ maintains a lead of 5 points over the PQ, which appears to have reached a plateau, and support for sovereignty is only 33 percent. Hearings on the Charter start mid-January for a period of two months, and we will see what impact they have.

Signes religieux: Pauline Marois sur la défensive | Martin Ouellet | Politique québécoise.

One of the Quebec nursing unions, La Fédération interprofessionnelle de la santé du Québec (FIQ), surveyed its members showing 60 percent supported the charter. In contrast, most hospitals and other health associations have come out against the charter, given the large number of employees that would be affected, and the impact on operations that would occur.

La FIQ appuie la Charte des valeurs | Hugo Pilon-Larose | Santé

But a number of the larger unions that are members of the FIQ, particularly two in Montreal, have dissociated themselves from this endorsement of the Charter:

Charte de la laïcité: d’importants syndicats se dissocient de la FIQ | Hugo Pilon-Larose | Politique québécoise