School board chair blasts decision to hold election amid pandemic
The outgoing head of the Lester B. Pearson School Board says the provincial government's about-face on holding school board elections has all the appearances of an effort to induce voter suppression.
Noel Burke said the decision to hold elections five days before Christmas, with Montreal still firmly in the grips of a pandemic, is “making a mockery of the electoral process and democracy.”
“It's a real mess,” he said. “The whole rationale for suspending the (Nov. 1) elections was that we were in a red zone. Suddenly now, we're in a red zone, but now it's OK?”
Burke, who isn't seeking re-election to the Pearson board, said a low voter turnout would help the government's plan, under Bill 40, to abolish English-language school boards and replace them with service centres. French-language school boards have already transformed to service centres.
“It bolsters their argument that having school boards elections is a useless venture because (they'll say) the English community is not really engaged in these school boards. That's not really a big stretch given the circumstances,” Burke said.
Both the heads of the Quebec English School Boards Association and Quebec Community Groups Network also blasted the decision to hold school board elections.
Judy Kelley, a candidate for LBPSB chair, criticized Education Minister Jean-françois Roberge's decision in a Facebook post: “In a truly disrespectful and disgraceful slap in the face to English School Boards in Quebec, the Education Minister thought it wise ... to announce that our school board elections will now be held on Dec. 19 (advance poll) and 20th in the middle of an almost lock-down, red-zone, pandemic, because he can.”
Burke said the government's initial decision to hold school board elections on Nov. 1 led to “a ton of acclamations in the LBPSB, really a ridiculous amount.”
Nine of 12 commissioner positions in the LBPSB were acclaimed. Across Quebec, 83 of 95 positions were filled by acclamation.
Kelley and Chris Eustace are the two candidates vying for the LBPSB'S chair position, while elections for commissioners will take place in Wards 2, 3 and 4.
Eustace, a longtime school board critic, also ran for the chair position in 2014 but lost to then-incumbent Suanne Stein Day, who later resigned under a cloud of controversy. If elected as chair, he stated his first order of business will be to drop membership to QESBA.
Meanwhile, Burke said the elections should be postponed until at least June, after Bill 40 court hearings and hopefully after the worst of the pandemic has passed.
“You would think the minister would be busy (halting) the proliferation of the virus through schools and not whether or not to have an election. An election in the English sector, in 10 per cent of (Quebec's population), would be number 11 on my list of things to do,” he said. “It's typical of a government that really has no time for the English-speaking community. It's thinly veiled but it's quite obvious.”