Board playing chicken

Vincent J. Curtis

17 mar 22

RE: Board shortens its masking rules.  By Kate McCullough.  The Hamilton Spectator 17 Mar 22

You have to wonder why the School Board is playing chicken with the Education Minister, and, frankly, with the rule of law.  After being slapped down by both Education Minister Steve Lecce and Premier Doug Ford for ordering a mask mandate in school through April 15, which is illegal, the Board is now lessening the offence by illegally extending it only to April Fool’s day.

Illegal?? Board Chair Dawn Danko admits that the Board does not have the authority to extend mandates beyond provincial limits.  So, what’s the game here? Is it sheer incompetence?  If they admitted lack the authority, why are they pretending to have it anyway?  There is a respect for the rule of law aspect to this.

The Board has the physical power to suspend and expel students who defy the illegal mandates of the Board, and by the time the matter is adjudicated, it will be moot.  The Board is playing a game of chicken with the provincial government and with its own students, those who defy the Board.  Never mind the Board recommendation to be lenient, a principal might just choose to follow his own drummer, just like the Board is.  Referring to an exemption policy that already exists, a policy that introduces bureaucratic barriers to freedom from tyranny, doesn’t make the mandate extension any less illegal.

What a mess!  Masks are now known as “facial decorations” because it is now recognized that the vast majority of them are useless.  Young people are the least at risk from COVID.  Yet the Board chooses this issue to challenge the rule of law in the course of virtue-signalling?  Stupid, and incompetent!!!

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