TORONTO, Ontario, June 1, 2012 (LifeSiteNews.com) – The chief commissioner of the controversial Ontario Human Rights Commission opened the door to the possibility last month that the McGuinty government’s ‘gay rights’ bill could be applied to the province’s private schools.
In her May 15th submission in support of Bill 13, Barbara Hall claimed that Ontario’s human rights code is the province’s “highest law,” and argued that “all schools-including public, Catholic and private-have a legal duty to provide students with an educational environment free from harassment and other forms of discrimination.”
The government’s “anti-bullying bill”, which could be voted on any day now, has faced intense opposition from parents and pro-family advocates who believe its hyper-focus on homosexual-related bullying represents a threat to parental rights and religious freedom.
The bill mandates homosexual clubs – and now “gay-straight alliances” – for all publicly-funded schools, including Catholic schools, though Hall’s comments have raised concerns that the OHRC may apply it to private schools as well.
According to Brian Lilley, the host of Sun News Network’s Byline, Hall’s remark “means that even if Catholic schools stop taking money over the imposition of gay-straight alliances they will still have to allow them in Barbara Hall’s world.”
The McGuinty government fanned the flames of controversy over the bill last week when they announced that they were amending it to require schools to allow “gay-straight alliances,” which have been used by homosexual activists in Canada and the U.S. to infiltrate schools.
The issue has become a flash point for Ontario’s Catholic bishops, who had said they would allow clubs focusing on homosexuality, but in accord with Catholic teaching and without the GSA name.
In a statement Monday after the government announced the GSA amendment, Cardinal Thomas Collins of Toronto suggested the amendment “overrides the deeply held beliefs” of the Church and “intrudes on its freedom to act in a way that is in accord with its principles of conscience.”
Lilley argues that Hall’s openness to targeting private schools under the human rights code is more evidence for the elimination Canada’s human rights commissions, which have in many cases been used to target conservatives and Christians.
“Barbara Hall does not make the laws in Ontario despite what she may think,” he writes. “She is a mere public servant, there to do the bidding of the legislature, not direct. This is another reason that Hall has to go and her Commission be scrapped.”
See related stories:
* Ontario party: Human rights commission moving to ‘take over’ education, could threaten homeschooling
* Ontario Human Rights Commission Proudly Promoting the Gay Agenda