Brampton calls on cities across Canada to 'join the fight' against Quebec's Bill 21

When Quebec enacted Bill 21 in March 2019, Razia Hamidi had an unfortunate decision to make.

She could continue living in the province that had just made it illegal for people like her to work in the public sector, or she could leave.

She chose to leave, and a year and a half ago she resettled in Brampton, Ont. with her family.

"The climate it's created in Quebec was really something I didn't want to live through anymore, being a woman who is visibly Muslim and wears the headscarf," Hamidi said. "I feel like [Bill 21] legitimizes a lot of Islamophobia that exists in Quebec."

On Wednesday, Hamidi was happy to learn that Brampton mayor Patrick Brown had issued an appeal to 100 Canadian mayors to "join the fight" against Quebec's Bill 21.

As part of a motion carried in a special council meeting at Brampton city hall, Brown invited mayors and councils from across the country to donate to legal funds fighting Bill 21 in courts.

"Gone are the days when we can turn a blind eye to an injustice we see across municipal, provincial, and even federal boundaries," Brown wrote in a letter. "Quebecers of all faiths are our brothers and sisters. They need our help."

Hamidi welcomed the mayor's motion, recalling participating in multiple Montreal organizations trying to create allyship and gather funding for the legal battle against the bill during her time in Quebec.

She says until now the burden for legal fees was on the backs of mosques, churches, synagogues, gurdwaras, and non-profit organizations like the National Council of Canadian Muslims, and the World Sikh Organization of Canada.

Bill 21 prohibits public workers in Quebec from wearing religious symbols, whether a headscarf, a turban, a kippah or a visible crucifix. The bill targets Muslims, Sikhs, Jews and Christians, many of whom wear religious symbols as an expression of their identity.

Hamidi says the bill "was a big factor in finally deciding to move back to Ontario with my family, not wanting to live in a province where the government is actively creating this tiered system of citizenship based on your religious identity and expression."

"I think a lot of local and municipal leaders, especially I hope our federal leaders, are going to have to answer for which side of history they were on in this period of Canada," Hamidi said, noting the bill has been in effect for two years.

Last week, a teacher in Chelsea, Que., Fatemeh Anvari, was reassigned from her job as a teacher to a position outside the classroom because she wore a headscarf.

Shortly after, Quebec's premier Francois Legault said the teacher shouldn't have been hired in the first place. That prompted backlash from communities across the country.