SPVM chief Fady Dagher announced Monday that he’s instituting a new policy on how police should question people – not those under arrest, but people that police simply want to question for any reason. “You have the right to leave” seems to be the key phrase.
This seems to be proposed as a weak alternative because police don’t want to give up making random stops, and it remains to be seen whether officers obey the guidelines or if they make any difference.
There will be no new pedestrianizations this summer. The same streets that were closed last summer will be back, except for St‑Hubert, where the merchants’ association voted to keep motor traffic flowing.
Radio-Canada puts on a positive spin about 7 km of pedestrianized space. It’s like it’s such a concession.
This has come up before here, and I’m still not sure of the answer: why is St‑Paul Street not included on the list? Or is the partial pedestrianization of Old Montreal a whole other thing?
Typical of this city, something works well, a tiny minority of uninformed voices shouts it down, and the city decides against doing more of the thing that’s backed by evidence and that most people like
Merchant’s Associations are a powerful lobby, which is why they exist. The city wants to stay on their good side for lot sof reasons including that commercial tax is a cash cow and being perceived as anti-business can kill an electoral bid. Rabouin rose so fast becasue Projet is trying to reposition itself as pro-business.
Condé Nast Traveler lists its 28 best restaurants here, but starts off on an odd foot with a mention of “corned beef sandwiches” in the headline. An even better misstep is the description of Candide: “Venture down the path along the south side of St. Joseph’s Church and you’ll spot a grand old graystone rectory.” I was puzzled by this description and checked the address, which is on obscure St‑Martin in Little Burgundy. But the link to “St. Joseph’s Church” goes to a page about the Oratory…
Lac St-Louis MP Francis Scarpaleggia has been elected as House of Commons Speaker for the new parliament.
Pity. His arguments against same-sex marriage rights are still in my mind:
https://openparliament.ca/debates/2005/3/24/francis-scarpaleggia-1/only/
Thanks for that, H. John.
Still in your mind from 20 years ago…
Happy to have you on this list, H. John. You’re a good, reliable voice of reason and, apparently, memory.
Did he ever say anything regretting it and saying he was wrong? I saw he was pretty heavily for “only civil union from the government” at the time, but my parents, who were about the same age, more or less agreed with that stance at the time, and over time moved fully into accepting gay marriage. (They were not, of course, politicians, and they were like many incorrect at the time — but that was the sort of moderate stance, once.)
PP of course was very explicitly against gay marriage and now is not.
@jeather the remarks in the link H. John shared basically cover his position from 20 years ago, i.e., that religious marriages should be preceded by civil marriages; these civil marriages should be open to same-sex couples so that religious marriages don’t have to accommodate them. It’s not really rooted in any persuasive evidence, just a lot of blather about how he’s a classical liberal or what amounts to an argument that we as a society are nothing if we are not bound by the arbitrary exclusionary practices of the past. I think the only place you hear these tortured arguments these days is from like the Jordan Peterson corner of the world, which is just about all you need other know.
That said, I would be curious about his perspective now that we have a couple of decades of same-sex marriage legalization – I don’t think you could conclude anything other than allowing same-sex couples to marry was not a big deal and was probably long overdue, that we didn’t need to twist our logic into ridiculous pretzels because, basically, some people find gays icky. You would hope someone who tried (and legit tried, even though IMO he failed) to muster up a reasoned and principled position might have evolved the way your parents did. You would really hope they would take that lesson and apply it to other civil rights issues (e.g., trans rights).
@jeather. Of course you are right. It was a widely held opinion. But your parents weren’t MP’s who had had the chance to read the decisions of the courts. When he shared his view three provincial Superior Courts, and three Courts of Appeal had already ruled that theissue was a clear breach of our Charter of Rights and Freedoms.
@joey First and foremost religious marriages are irrelevant to this debate.
I think you’re missing Scarpaleggia’s point. He was arguing against a Bill that would extend the definition of civil marriage to include same-sex couples. He was arguing it long after the courts had been clear that it was an issue protected by the Charter and that the government had the right to act to make the change. That was the Bill he voted against.
He states:
“I read with great interest the opinions of those who favour a redefinition of marriage, including the opinions of the courts and of some of my constituents and close friends. I am not indifferent to their arguments.”
“The state may have overstepped its bounds on the marriage issue. Bill C-38 refashions the meaning of marriage in Canadian culture. On a symbolic level, Bill C-38 reduces marriage to a vehicle for the affirmation of mutual romantic and sexual feeling and commitment between two individuals. Marriage’s profound role of linking the generations and bridging the gender gap is no longer central to the institution.”
“In January 2003, the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights undertook hearings across Canada on the issue of same sex marriage. …”
I testified before that Committee, and part of what I said was:
“I just want to add to what the earlier presenter mentioned.
In fact, the arguments being used are exactly the same ones as were used in the United States in the 1960s when the Supreme Court struck down the laws against marriage between races.
I understand how fundamentally held those beliefs are.
Although the laws were struck down in 1996, the State of South Carolina introduced a proposition to remove the old laws from its books, which was simply a way of tidying up the statutes. Forty percent of the people who came out to vote voted to keep the law against interracial marriage.
I really do understand that beliefs like this can be strongly held.
It doesn’t necessarily mean that opinion polls should lead the way. Hopefully, in fact, this is a legal issue and comes down to legal principles.”
@H. John good for you for speaking up at the time
Are religious marriages really “irrelevant” to the debate? In the link you posted, Scarpaleggia invokes religious marriage quite often, and not as an aside. For example:
“I favour engaging Canadians in a serious examination of a proposal that achieves both equality for gay and lesbian Canadians and state neutrality in dealing with marriage. The government should consider an approach raised by the Law Reform Commission of Canada: to create a neutral civil registry at the federal level, equally accessible to same sex or opposite sex couples, for the purposes of claiming federal benefits for individuals involved in formal conjugal relationships.
“Following a two step process similar to France’s, where a couple must first visit city hall before being married in a religious ceremony, under a Canadian civil registry system, a couple, after registering federally and partaking in a civil union ceremony in provincial jurisdiction, could be united in a same sex or opposite sex, religious or non-religious, privately sponsored ceremony of their choosing in as public a way as the couple chooses. Some would choose religious ceremonies. Others would use private facilitators to help write vows and perform a ceremony in a non-religious location of their choice. Marriage, thus cut loose from the state, would be allowed to settle back into civil culture and community.”
I suppose what he was really arguing for (possibly without grasping all the implications) was the end of all non-civil marriages…
@Joey I think Mr. Scarpaleggia knew exactly what he was doing.
He argues that the feds should create a “civil union” registry. He doesn’t use the word marriage because he’s arguing that marriage should remain defined as “between a man and a woman.”
Quebec already had a civil union system. There is a major difference in that under Private International Law civil unions, unlike marriage, are not portable. If you were married and you moved to Florida or Barbados, you were still married. If you have a civil union and do the same, your contract was not transferable.
This what he voted against:
Short title
1. This Act may be cited as the Civil Marriage Act.
Marriage — certain aspects of capacity
2. Marriage, for civil purposes, is the lawful union of two persons to the exclusion of all others.
Religious officials
3. It is recognized that officials of religious groups are free to refuse to perform marriages that are not in accordance with their religious beliefs.
The REM was down in both directions Monday morning.
Well it’s a sunny day! What did you expect? Lol
I haven’t been posting about the SAAQclic fiasco because it’s not a municipal issue, but this CBC summary of what’s known so far outlines a deeply corrupt story.
An annual festivity called Haitian Flag Day has been held peacefully in Montreal North since 2009. This year, the SPVM declined to offer security, so the event was cancelled. Organizers would like to understand why the borough or the police made this decision.
Twenty-six Nuns Island residents have managed to block a project that would have included 525 residential units near the REM.
If we’re going to forge ahead and build enough housing, maybe we should begin by restructuring local referendum laws so that NIMBY residents can’t do this.
In a way, this is a microcosm of people who, comfortable in their country of residence after immigrating, or since their ancestors immigrated, are now insistent that nobody else should have the same access.
Or professional associations artificially rationing access to work.
What’s crushingly disappointing is the extent to which Projet Montreal – despite the province empowering them *for once* to act – is bending over backwards not to upset a small group of NIMBYs in the midst of a generational housing crisis. What’s especially grating about this is how often the Projet leadership has had no problem telling all kinds of stakeholder groups to F off (even – especially! – those who are generally PM supporters and are actively trying to collaborate). Yet they completely roll over for a handful of NIMBYs.
I’m not pro NIMBYism and I think they should push this through but we just had an article about how Quebec won’t build the needed schools on Nun’s Island, so the residents aren’t wrong about the problem of building housing without related infrastructure.
Does anyone honestly believe that the same folks opposing the project (“Ce projet est laid et indigne de la classe de l’île des Sœurs,” said the guy who is worried about travel time to and from Montreal) would be OK with it if there were adequate daycare/school spots?
No, but they’re still not wrong about the inadequate infrastructure (the REM is nice in theory but who can depend on it now).
This project will likely end up being built in some form or another. All the developer has to do is re-apply and the city can use its new powers to bypass any attempt at a referendum. As the article explains, elected officials did not want to use that power in this case because the project was submitted for approval before Quebec changed the laws to make the new municipal powers available.
Maybe we should put a cost related to NIMBYism. You want to oppose the project, it will cost those people the reimburse the promoter for their costs. There is nothing in the law that says you get to oppose a project for free. Put up a cost and maybe they will have to really have a good reason.
steph 19:22 on 2025-05-26 Permalink
“I told them they had a right to leave. So they then chose leave. I found their choice to leave suspicious & that was enough motive to then detain and question them for NOT a random reason.”
Ian 17:58 on 2025-05-27 Permalink
What do you bet he uses this to justify a budget increase