Students at College Gerald-Godin in Ste. Geneviève make some noise about Bill 142

Students at College Gerald-Godin in Ste. Geneviève saw an opportunity to make themselves heard last Thursday morning during a news conference featuring Quebec Education Minister Jean-Marc Fournier's announcement of funding for a new pharmaceutical-technology diploma program at the school. The college's student union capitalized on Fournier's presence to deliver a message over Bill 142, which limits teachers' right to strike and protest options.

Gerald-Godin students' association spokesman Etienne Belanger-Caron took to the podium and read a statement decrying the law while about 100 of his student cohorts applauded loudly and vigorously while crowded around the lectern and the media area.

"We feel this law is unconstitutional and must be reconsidered. We are against Bill 142 and we are against lifting any tuition freezes," he said. "This is a clear message of our dissatisfaction with the government's policy on postsecondary education."

Fournier said later that any talk of lifting a tuition freeze is premature, but he was mum on coming elections that might call an end to the government's current mandate.

"We said we would keep the tuition freeze intact (for Quebec students at Quebec universities) though this mandate and we have no plans to change that," Fournier said, adding his government has spent more money on education in the past year than the Parti Québécois government spent in its nine years at the province's helm before 2003.

"We have $660 million in our education budget for 2006, whereas the previous government spent $600 million in their nine years in power," he said.