Quebec judge denies request to appeal decision maintaining school prayer space ban

Push to appeal Quebec’s prayer room ban A group is asking for permission to appeal a court ruling that denied its request to suspend Quebec’s ban on school prayer rooms.

A Muslim organization and a civil rights group seeking to suspend Quebec's ban on prayer spaces in public schools have been denied leave to appeal a court decision that maintained the ban.

Quebec Court of Appeal Justice Robert Mainville ruled Wednesday that he's not convinced the appeal — which sought to allow the prayer spaces while the courts hear a constitutional challenge — had a reasonable chance of success.

"The courts will not lightly order that a duly adopted law or regulation be rendered inoperative before it has undergone a full constitutional review, since it is presumed to have been adopted in the public interest," Mainville wrote.

The Canadian Civil Liberties Association and the National Council of Canadian Muslims are challenging the constitutionality of the prayer space ban. A lawyer for the two groups had argued before Mainville on Monday that a Quebec Superior Court judge erred in June when he refused to suspend the ban.

Olga Redko said the rule, which forbids schools from making any space available on school grounds for students to pray overtly, will cause irreparable harm to Muslim students. The Superior Court judge failed to properly consider the significance of the harm and the urgency of the situation, with classes scheduled to resume in late August and no trial date set, she said.

But Mainville disagreed and said he's not convinced the harm caused by the ban is serious enough to justify a suspension. He said constitutional issues raised by the decree would have to be decided at trial.

"Indeed, the very incomplete evidence at this stage of the case does not demonstrate that the creation of prayer spaces in Quebec's public schools is necessary to ensure freedom of religion or responds to an urgent and real religious imperative," he wrote. "Rather, the evidence shows that this is a very recent request by certain students of the Muslim faith who appear to have been able to perform their religious duties in the past without such arrangements in public schools."

The groups had argued the rule is effectively a total ban on prayer for Muslim students, whose prayer practices require physical action.

However, Mainville, who accepted the government's argument that the ban is intended to preserve the secular nature of Quebec's public schools, found that only prayer spaces were targeted. Mainville said the limits on religious freedoms don't appear to be serious enough to justify suspending the law before a trial.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published July 26, 2023.