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Hundreds of people have been arrested as college students across Quebec have been on strike for more than 10 weeks in protests against a 75% tuition increase over 5 years.

What started in late March with a quarter of a million people taking to the streets of Montreal in what may be Canada’s largest ever protest, has now grown to encompass environmentalists, high school students, social justice activists, and more. Now in its 11th week, nearly 200,000 college and university students remain on strike, mostly in the city of Montreal, but also at a smaller scale throughout the province of Quebec.

The Canadian government’s initial response was to ignore the protesters and claim that the tuition increase was unavoidable. But as the strike has continued, stronger tactics have caught the government’s attention. These include: barricading government buildings, shutting down the local subway through the use of smoke bombs, and throwing bricks onto the rail lines. Police have routinely used pepper spray, concussion grenades, and batons leading to many injuries and even one protester losing an eye when a flash bang exploded close to his face.

Students also targeted a development summit last week where Quebec’s Premier Jean Charest spoke. Charest told the press that his government has twice “extended our hand” to students for negotiations. He added, “I find it unacceptable that one student association… refuses to condemn violence.” This week, negotiations between the Education Minister Line Beauchamp, and representatives from some of the student groups involved in the strike, broke down. The 48 hour meeting began on Monday, but ended sooner than expected after Beauchamp pulled out saying that one of the student groups, CLASSE, had violated a 48 hour ceasefire on actions.

GUESTS: Léo Bureau-Blouin, President of the FECQ (Fédération étudiante collégiale du Québec), Stefanie Claremont, a reporter with CKUT community radio in Montreal, who has been extensively covering the student strike, Lilian Radovac, writer, activist, and doctoral candidate in communication studies at McGill University where she recently led a successful campaign to unionize lecturers – she recently wrote about the Quebec strike.

Click here to listen to Stefanie Claremont’s reports on the student strike.

Stefanie also recommended CUTV, online at www.cutvmontreal.ca, and the Montreal Media Collective, online at www.mediacoop.ca.

Click here to Lilian Radovac’s article about the strike.