The Anglophone East District Education Council has agreed to give up its Charter challenge of the province’s Policy 713, if the Minister of Education promises to leave the District’s policy on student names and pronouns alone. But it doesn’t appear that Minister Bill Hogan will take them up on the offer.
On Thursday evening, Hogan reiterated his intention to dissolve the Anglophone East District Education Council, if the council doesn’t immediately stop its court challenge to the province’s changes to Policy 713. Hogan said in an emailed statement that the DEC leadership has “left me no options but to commence the process for dissolution of the Anglophone East DEC.”
In a letter on April 30, Hogan called out the DEC for spending nearly $280,000 on lawyers and experts in its case against the province, and ordered the council to complete a list of four corrective actions, including dropping its case. Hogan gave a deadline of 5pm Thursday.
The day Hogan sent that letter was also the deadline that Judge Tracey DeWare had given the DEC to file their full claim on Policy 713.
In early April, the DEC had filed preliminary motions asking for a court injunction to prevent the Minister from repealing their policy and dissolving the council while the court considered their case against Policy 713. At a premliminary hearing on April 15, CBC Moncton’s Shane Magee reported that provincial lawyers told Judge DeWare they would seek to toss out the DEC’s full case, once it was filed. DeWare then gave the DEC two weeks to file their case, and gave the province a deadline of May 15 to respond. DEC lawyers filed their full claim with Moncton’s Court of King’s Bench on Wednesday, May 1.
Then late Thursday afternoon Anglophone East DEC chair Harry Doyle responded to Hogan’s April 30 letter, refusing a number of the minister’s demands, but offering to comply with Hogan’s request that the DEC drop its main case, provided the Minister in turn refrain from further interfering with the DEC’s own policy governing the implementation of Policy 713.
The Anglophone East policy (Policy 1.8) requires staff to consult with transgender or non-binary students of any age to determine their preferred first name and pronoun, and then use those consistently. That offers a stronger protection for students than the province’s Policy 713, which was revised by Hogan last year, and now requires teachers to get parental consent before using a name requested by a student, if they are under 16 years of age.
Last week Hogan repealed the DEC’s policy, but within two days, the Anglophone East council had met and approved a new version of the same policy.
Thursday’s response from the DEC represents a potential concession in the standoff between the elected council and the Minister, and if accepted by Hogan, would mean one less court challenge against his revisions to Policy 713. A Canadian Civil Liberties Association lawsuit is proceeding in a Fredericton court, with a judge recently ruling on who will be allowed to present evidence in the case.
In Monday, the judge and lawyers for the province and the DEC are scheduled to have a case conference on Friday.
