By Jamie Mouratova, Year 10
With Canada’s annual immigration admission said to increase 40,000 by 2021, we’re expected to only smile and be filled with hope by how big these positive figures are.
However, not all of Canada’s completely on board with this bold new step. While no actions have been taken to protest against this increase directly, the government of Quebec is taking a detour and passing a new rule, Bill 21, that will be in effect from the summer of 2019 and on.
Bill 21 consists of prohibiting the act of bearing any sort of religious symbol, such as hijabs, christian crosses, kirpans, and the like while working a government job. On the surface, the new bill seemingly has no connection to the increasing number of authorised immigrant admissions. However, an ulterior motive made itself clear when the argument that won the Coalition Avenir Quebec political group a place of power came to light.
The CAQ claims that the objective of passing bill 21 is not to target any particular religious minority, but to affirm Quebec’s general secularism. However, the exact general argument that the CAQ made in order to achieve victory in their winning political debate was that “there were too many immigrants coming to the province,” on account of the province’s institutions being threatened by non-christianity originating overseas. The CAQ swore to correct this “issue” through being elected, and as a result, cast a dark shadow of doubt on the claims the CAQ themselves made about Bill 21 being neither biased nor discriminatory.
