No Summer Break for Students' Fight

OTTAWA, June 22, 2012 /CNW/ - While Québec Premier Jean Charest adjourned the National Assembly for the summer, students continue to face the consequences of his tuition fee hikes and the clamp down on civil liberties. Today, students will be marching in Quebec City and Montreal to mark 131 days on strike.

"The government's continued refusal to negotiate and work towards a solution is reprehensible," said Adam Awad, National Chairperson of the Canadian Federation of Students. "Arresting and ignoring students will not change the fact that thousands of students will be harmed by the tuition fee increases."

As the Quebec student strike enters its fifth month, students and community members continue to push back against the privatization of education and the criminalization of dissent through nightly "casseroles" protests. Charest's crackdown on freedoms to peaceful assembly and protest has garnered national and international condemnation from student groups, labour unions, non-governmental organizations, and the United Nations.

"The Charest government must come back to the negotiating table," said Awad. "The cost of policing the protests and enforcing Law 78 has now far surpassed the total cost of the tuition fee increases. The arrests of civilians throughout Quebec under Law 78 are a waste of money and an affront to the values enshrined in the Charter of Rights and Freedoms."

The Canadian Federation of Students is Canada's largest student organization, uniting more than one-half million students in all ten provinces. The Federation and its predecessor organizations have represented students in Canada since 1927.

Adam Awad, National Chairperson, 613-979-6622 (cell), [email protected] (In Montreal)