Petition to the Legislative Assembly of Ontario

One Public School System for Ontario

Whereas the Ontario Government discriminates against over seven million non-Catholic Ontarians in publicly- funded school choice and religious school funding;

Whereas one-third of the province’s publicly-funded teaching positions are effectively closed to non-Catholic applicants;

Whereas all Ontarians pay equal taxes based on income, not faith, and deserve equal respect and consideration from a religiously neutral provincial government;

Whereas Canada was found in violation of its international human rights obligations by the UN Human Rights Committee in 1999 and again in 2005 by virtue of the discrimination in the funding of religious schools in Ontario;

Whereas the UN Human Rights Committee is now considering a new complaint against Canada concerning the religious discrimination in employment in Ontario’s publicly-funded separate schools;

Whereas the religious segregation of Ontario children undermines the development of truly neighbourhood schools;

Whereas the religious segregation of Ontario children also results in de facto racial and ethnic segregation that further undermines the role of public schools in fostering tolerance and respect between Ontarians of different backgrounds;

Whereas the duplication in our school system has extensive financial ramifications that limit the potential of all public school children and contribute to school funding crises that seem to worsen every year;

Whereas Quebec and Newfoundland eliminated constitutionally mandated denominational schools in the 1990s, after securing a constitutional amendment rescinding denominational school rights; and

Whereas Ontario could secure a similar amendment through a simple bilateral agreement with the Federal Government alone;

We, the undersigned, respectfully petition the Ontario Legislature to establish the primacy of fundamental equality rights over non-fundamental denominational privilege by merging Ontario's public and separate school systems into a single public school system for each official language (English and French).