In the wake of the Bedford school controversy, opposition parties called on the government to defund private religious schools, a proposal that Quebec’s main private school association says would end up costing the government and parents more.
Earlier this week, the Parti Quebecois (PQ) leader, Paul St-Pierre Plamondon, characterized the Bedford case as an example of “Islamist invasion” and made a series of suggestions to the government to strengthen secularism in Quebec, including cutting subsidies to religious schools.
Quebec Solidaire followed suit and on Wednesday tabled a motion asking the government to consider ending public funding for private denominational schools. It was rejected by the CAQ government.
“I really don’t understand where this argument comes from, especially [since] the problems we’ve been seeing in the news recently have not been associated to private schools, but to the public sector,” said David Bowles, the Chairman of Federation of private educational institutions.
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