After Bill 21, Quebec’s controversial religious symbols ban, was adopted late Sunday night, opposition parties accused the Coalition Avenir Québec government of slyly amending the bill to create what they call a “secularism police.”

The bill came down to a final vote around 10:30 p.m. on Sunday, capping off two back-to-back marathon sessions after the government invoked closure.

Without prior notice, Minister of Immigration, Diversity and Inclusiveness Simon Jolin-Barrette made two last-minute amendments. One of those amendments allows a minister to “verify the application of the measures provided in the present law” or “designate in writing a person who will be in charge of this verification.”

Another amendment allows for unspecified “disciplinary measures” to be taken against employees who don’t adhere to the ban on religious symbols.

Opposition parties against the bill said they were completely taken by surprise.

“This potential to have this police, this type of police, wasn’t part of the debate at all,” said Liberal MNA Marc Tanguay.

Tanguay and colleague Hélène David accused the minister of deliberately hiding the amendments from the opposition.

“We asked again if he had any substantial amendments this very afternoon (Sunday afternoon) within the process of the baillon (closure), and he said: ‘You know what? You’ll have the amendment when I’m ready to give it to you,’” Tanguay said.

“Will there be police officers going after people to check if they have religious signs? We don’t know. It’s not clear. We didn’t even have time to analyze this modification clearly. They did it in a very undemocratic way,” said Québec Solidaire MNA Sol Zanetti.

David added that she’s concerned that people in charge of enforcing the religious symbols ban will make subjective decisions because “the religious signs are so imprecise…their definition is really unclear.”

Jolin-Barrette tabled an amendment last Tuesday in the National Assembly that specifically seeks to define what a religious symbol is.

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