From LifeSiteNews

By Anthony Murdoch

Quebec’s Secularism Minister, Jean-François Roberge, introduced Bill 9, ‘An Act respecting the reinforcement of laicity in Quebec,’ in the province’s National Assembly on Thursday, November 27.

The government of Quebec has tabled a new bill which, if passed, would ban public prayer and funding for religious schools, and more severely oppose public displays of religious symbols.  

Quebec’s government now has its very own Secularism Minister, Jean-François Roberge. He introduced Bill 9, ‘An Act respecting the reinforcement of laicity in Quebec,’ in the province’s National Assembly on Thursday, November 27. Critics have warned that it is an attack on people’s religious rights. Nevertheless, Quebec says it will use the notwithstanding clause to ensure that the legislation remains law, thwarting any legal challenges made against it. 

Six years ago, Quebec passed a law that banned teachers, judges, police officers, and other officials from wearing religious symbols. However,  Roberge has told reporters that the new legislation is needed because people have “advanced.”

“Quebecers have advanced since 2019, which means it is necessary to strengthen our model of secularism,” he said, adding that the new law would be “ambitious, but moderate.”

This August, as reported by LifeSiteNews, Quebec announced that it was looking to ban prayer in public places; Muslim groups had begun praying in Quebec streets and parks.

Earlier this year, Quebec expanded its so-called religious symbols ban to include all school staff, meaning no one who works at a school would be allowed to wear crucifixes or crosses of any kind.

RELATED: New Quebec bill would prohibit teachers, school staff from wearing a crucifix

This new law would also ban the wearing of hijabs and turbans for those working in schools, daycares, and universities. It could prevent teachers from wearing crucifix jewellery even in a Catholic school and ban any religious symbol from appearing in any communications from public institutions. It would also ban prayer rooms in public institutions.

Quebec Premier François Legault fully backs the new law, saying earlier this month there is a threat in his province from “radical Islamists.”

Earlier this year, as reported by LifeSiteNews, Montreal’s Catholic Archbishop Christian Lépine condemned Quebec’s proposed prayer ban and said it was like banning thought.

“Prayer, in its simplest form, is an inner impulse,” he wrote. “It is a thought turned toward God who is goodness, a presence in the world, a way of seeking peace. However, some recent proposals to ban public prayer raise serious concerns about respect for fundamental freedoms in a democratic society.”

From the Fraser Institute

By Kenneth P. Green

The stiffer carbon tax will make Alberta’s oil sector more expensive and thus less competitive at a time when many analysts expect a surge in oil production. The costs of mandated carbon capture will similarly increase costs in the oilsands and make the province less cost competitive.

As we enter the final days of 2025, a “deal” has been struck between Carney government and the Alberta government over the province’s ability to produce and interprovincially transport its massive oil reserves (the world’s 4th-largest). The agreement is a step forward and likely a net positive for Alberta and its citizens. However, it’s not a second- or even third-best option, but rather a fourth-best option.

The agreement is deeply rooted in the development of a particular technology—the Pathways carbon capture, utilization and storage (CCUS) project, in exchange for relief from the counterproductive regulations and rules put in place by the Trudeau government. That relief, however, is attached to a requirement that Alberta commit to significant spending and support for Ottawa’s activist industrial policies. Also, on the critical issue of a new pipeline from Alberta to British Columbia’s coast, there are commitments but nothing approaching a guarantee.

Specifically, the agreement—or Memorandum of Understanding (MOU)—between the two parties gives Alberta exemptions from certain federal environmental laws and offers the prospect of a potential pathway to a new oil pipeline to the B.C. coast. The federal cap on greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from the oil and gas sector will not be instituted; Alberta will be exempt from the federal “Clean Electricity Regulations”; a path to a million-barrel-per day pipeline to the BC coast for export to Asia will be facilitated and established as a priority of both governments, and the B.C. tanker ban may be adjusted to allow for limited oil transportation. Alberta’s energy sector will also likely gain some relief from the “greenwashing” speech controls emplaced by the Trudeau government.

In exchange, Alberta has agreed to implement a stricter (higher) industrial carbon-pricing regime; contribute to new infrastructure for electricity transmission to both B.C. and Saskatchewan; support through tax measures the building of a massive “sovereign” data centre; significantly increase collaboration and profit-sharing with Alberta’s Indigenous peoples; and support the massive multibillion-dollar Pathways project. Underpinning the entire MOU is an explicit agreement by Alberta with the federal government’s “net-zero 2050” GHG emissions agenda.

The MOU is probably good for Alberta and Canada’s oil industry. However, Alberta’s oil sector will be required to go to significantly greater—and much more expensive—lengths than it has in the past to meet the MOU’s conditions so Ottawa supports a west coast pipeline.

The stiffer carbon tax will make Alberta’s oil sector more expensive and thus less competitive at a time when many analysts expect a surge in oil production. The costs of mandated carbon capture will similarly increase costs in the oilsands and make the province less cost competitive. There’s additional complexity with respect to carbon capture since it’s very feasibility at the scale and time-frame stipulated in the MOU is questionable, as the historical experience with carbon capture, utilization and storage for storing GHG gases sustainably has not been promising.

These additional costs and requirements are why the agreement is the not the best possible solution. The ideal would have been for the federal government to genuinely review existing laws and regulations on a cost-benefit basis to help achieve its goal to become an “energy superpower.” If that had been done, the government would have eliminated a host of Trudeau-era regulations and laws, or at least massively overhauled them.

Instead, the Carney government, and now with the Alberta government, has chosen workarounds and special exemptions to the laws and regulations that still apply to everyone else.

Again, it’s very likely the MOU will benefit Alberta and the rest of the country economically. It’s no panacea, however, and will leave Alberta’s oil sector (and Alberta energy consumers) on the hook to pay more for the right to move its export products across Canada to reach other non-U.S. markets. It also forces Alberta to align itself with Ottawa’s activist industrial policy—picking winning and losing technologies in the oil-production marketplace, and cementing them in place for decades. A very mixed bag indeed.

Kenneth P. Green

Senior Fellow, Fraser Institute