XPost: can.politics, ont.politics, qc.politics   
   From: {~_~}@nyet.ca   
      
   Really?  Isn't the 'notwithstanding clause' a part of the Constitution?   
     And didn't Quebec NOT SIGN the Canadian Constitution?   
   How do they invoke a clause within a Constitution that they're not a   
   part of?   
   ____________________________________________   
      
   Quebec   
      
   After the Charter came into force in 1982, Quebec inserted a   
   notwithstanding clause into all its laws; this stopped in 1987, when the   
   Quebec Liberals, having ousted the Parti Québécois, determined the   
   practice should not be continued. However, the most notable use of the   
   notwithstanding clause came in the Quebec language law known as Bill 101   
   after sections of those laws were found unconstitutional by the Supreme   
   Court of Canada in Ford v. Quebec (A.G.). On December 21, 1988, the   
   National Assembly of Quebec, under Robert Bourassa's Liberal government,   
   employed the "notwithstanding clause" to override freedom of expression   
   in the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms (section 2b) as well as   
   the Quebec Charter of Human Rights and Freedoms, and equality rights of   
   the Quebec Charter, in their Bill 178.  This allowed Quebec to continue   
   the restriction against the posting of certain commercial signs in   
   languages other than French.  In 1993, after the law was criticized by   
   the United Nations Human Rights Committee, the Bourassa government had   
   the provincial parliament rewrite the law to conform to the Charter, and   
   the notwithstanding clause was removed.   
   ______________________________________________   
      
   PQ’s Marois vows to use notwithstanding clause to save values charter   
      
   Federal Conservatives have vowed to launch court challenge if Quebec ban   
   on religious symbols becomes law.   
      
   TROIS-RIVIÈRES, QUE.— Parti Québécois Leader Pauline Marois says she   
   will invoke the Constitution's notwithstanding clause to save her   
   proposed charter of values if it is ultimately deemed illegal by the courts.   
      
   The values charter would ban public servants, including teachers,   
   doctors, daycare workers and bureaucrats from wearing religious symbols   
   at work. The PQ says it is a necessary measure designed to underline the   
   religious neutrality of the state.   
      
   A number of legal scholars have said that it would clash with certain   
   Charter rights such as freedom of expression and religion and have   
   predicted it would ultimately be deemed illegal by the Supreme Court of   
   Canada. The federal Conservative government has vowed to launch such a   
   legal challenge if ever the charter becomes law.   
      
   Marois, who is in a tough re-election battle with the Quebec Liberal   
   party, said she is determined to pass the charter into law and will not   
   stand for any meddling by outsiders.   
      
   “We want to be certain that this charter can be adopted and applied.   
   When we see the articles coming from elsewhere outside of Quebec that   
   people want to intervene in our campaign I think at that point we have   
   to leave no doubt with the population,” Marois said Monday. “If it comes   
   to pass that the charter will be contested we will apply the   
   notwithstanding clause.”   
      
   Related: Liberals accuse PQ of ‘despicable’ ploy to spark Quebec referendum   
      
   PQ returns to charter, language laws in Quebec election’s final week   
      
   Read more about the Quebec election here   
      
   The fiery pledge comes as a surprise. When the values charter was   
   introduced last fall, Marois said she was confident that the legislation   
   would pass the necessary legal tests. In September she told Montreal's   
   Le Devoir newspaper: “We're not launching a legal battle.”   
      
   What has changed since then is a healthy rise in the pre-election polls   
   for the PQ followed by a downward slide when the party's campaign   
   message was diverted, leaving Marois and some of her star candidates   
   musing about a third referendum and an independent Quebec. With just one   
   week left until the April 7 vote, Marois's party is determined to focus   
   voters' attention on the popular but divisive charter.   
      
   But even that was put in peril Monday morning by a column published in   
   La Presse newspaper citing PQ sources who said that the grand strategy   
   behind the values charter was to pass it into law, have it be struck   
   down by the courts and use that defeat to leverage support for a third   
   referendum vote to separate Quebec from Canada.   
      
   Marois denied she was inviting a battle with Prime Minister Stephen   
   Harper or his Conservative government, which has a light presence in   
   Quebec with only five MPs from the province.   
      
   “We're not looking for a fight with Ottawa. Never. What we're looking   
   for is to have Ottawa respect Quebec — respect our laws, respect our   
   direction, respect our language,” Marois said.   
      
   The notwithstanding clause is perhaps the most controversial section of   
   the Charter of Rights and Freedoms and has been invoked rarely since the   
   document was adopted by Ottawa in 1981.   
      
   The most notable instance came in the 1980s after the Supreme Court of   
   Canada struck down a Quebec law because it judged that imposing a   
   French-only rule for commercial signage was an unfair limitation on   
   freedom of expression.   
      
   It has also been invoked to protect back-to-work legislation that the   
   courts in Saskatchewan had ruled was a violation of the Charter's   
   freedom of association. A later appeal ultimately sided with the   
   government. In 2000, a private member's bill in Alberta that defined   
   marriage as a union between a heterosexual couple used the   
   notwithstanding clause until a Supreme Court ruling in 2004 that the   
   federal government had sole jurisdiction over who could marry.   
      
   In the dying days of the 2005-06 federal election campaign in which   
   Harper's Conservatives defeated Paul Martin's Liberal party, when   
   Martin's imminent defeat became clear, he made a last-ditch promise to   
   ban handguns and prevent provinces from opting out of the legislation by   
   abolishing the notwithstanding clause. It was widely seen as a sign of   
   desperation in the dying days of the campaign.   
      
   Marois said her sudden pledge to invoke the clause was a sign of her   
   determination rather than her desperation.   
      
   “We don't look very desperate. You can be assured that that is not the   
   reason,” she said, adding that the charter is designed to instill two   
   fundamental principles in provincial law — the secular nature of the   
   state and the equality of men and women.   
      
   “I won't take the chance with something that is as fundamental for me as   
   this secularism charter . . . If it takes legal tools that are more   
   powerful we will use them.”   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)