Court victory for McGill and Concordia not as sweeping as it might appear
April 29, 2025
The news that a Quebec Superior Court judge has struck down both the Quebec government’s tuition increases for out-of-province students, as well as its mandate that most of those students attain a certain level of proficiency in French by the time they graduate, appeared like a major victory for both McGill and Concordia, which had launched their legal challenge to the policy more than a year ago.
The decision, however, is a less resounding victory for McGill and Concordia than one might assume. By focusing on the government’s failure to provide sufficiently compelling evidence to back up its policies, rather than dealing with the claim that the policies violated the Quebec and Canadian Charter of Rights, Judge Éric Dufour has in effect upheld the underlying premise of the Quebec government’s policies.
The decision comes after more than two years that saw both universities scramble to deal with the budgetary pressures arising from the tuition changes and struggle to implement the onerous language requirements that were set to take effect in September.
They have also spent much of this time defending themselves against suggestions that they are contributing to the decline of the French language in Montreal and thus represent a threat to the larger social fabric of the province.
McGill and Concordia could derive some satisfaction from the fact that Dufour appeared to agree with some of their reasoning. In striking down the tuition increase, for example, Dufour challenges the government’s stated reasons for the tuition increase for out-of-province students and for the French-language requirements being imposed on them.
The government had argued these new measures were needed because English-speaking students from outside the province were contributing to the anglicization of Montreal. Dufour notes that such claims were “not justified by existing and convincing data.”
Dufour also suggests that the French-language requirements set to be imposed on these out-of-province students is “unreasonable given the near-certain impossibility of achievement.” The government’s reasoning for imposing such a requirement, the judge adds, is also contradictory because the government argues on the one hand that English-speaking students arrive in the province unprepared to integrate into Quebec society, by which it means French-speaking Quebec society.
On the other hand, the government also complains that these same out-of-province English-speaking students are leaving the province after they graduate. As Dufour writes, “The evidence shows that the ministry has absolutely no data on this subject, or only fragile information to back it up.”
As much as this decision will offer McGill and Concordia some measure of relief, it is not as sweeping a victory as it might at first appear.
For one thing, Dufour chooses not to take up the constitutional issue raised by the two universities in their challenge, namely that these policies are targeting their institutions in a manner that is discriminatory and that violates both the Canadian and Quebec charters of rights.
Moreover, the judge does not challenge the government’s underlying rationale for implementing these policies, which is to say he does not object to the idea of using such policies in order to preserve the French language in Quebec. “Increased protection of the French language remains fundamental,” he writes, “especially considering the linguistic context in which Quebec finds itself, a continent populated predominantly by Anglo-Saxons.”
In other words, the judge seems to be suggesting, McGill and Concordia do not possess fundamental rights to be defended in this particular instance. They simply have the right to be shielded from these tuition increases and these language policies because the government has so far failed to provide sufficient evidence that these policies are necessary to achieve its stated goal of protecting the French language.
As Dufour writes, the protection of the French language “does not justify the creation of policies and the making of decisions … based on erroneous or absent data.”
In the end, the judge is not pushing back against the idea that McGill and Concordia are contributing to the decline of the French language, nor is he suggesting that tuition increases or language requirements for students cannot be imposed. He is suggesting, rather, that the government can impose such policies only after it has offered compelling data to justify their necessity.
The ruling thus offers a short-term reprieve to both universities, but it does nothing to push back against the government’s claims that McGill and Concordia represent threats to Quebec’s survival as a French-speaking society.
