Canadian Jewish Congress Asks Quebec Government for Anti-discrimination Legislation

The Canadian Jewish Congress asked the Quebec Government today for new anti-discrimination legislation and urged the adoption of a provincial bill of rights and the establishment of a human rights commission. A brief submitted by CJC president Monroe Abbey to Quebec’s Premier Robert Bourassa, said the organization considered existing anti-discrimination legislation to be “fragmentary, incomplete and lacking in clarity.” In its submission, the CJC referred to the existing deprivation of franchise for Jewish citizens in the election of local Protestant school boards created by an order-in-council in several Montreal suburbs as “a most glaring example of discrimination.” The brief also called on the Quebec Premier to see to it that “all Quebecers be deemed as equal in status and that no distinction be made between residents both in Quebec and these who settled in Quebec or arrived before or after a certain date.”