The Lamrock factor: Ex-politician's intervention on Policy 713 offers Higgs a lifeline
Youth advocate’s blunt criticism, call for ‘reasonable’ compromise are hallmarks of his long career
His Progressive Conservatives took power after the previous Liberal government of Brian Gallant lost a confidence vote on its throne speech.
Higgs's team had to draft a throne speech of their own that would set out a common purpose despite clear political divisions in the province.
It required an eloquent articulation of hard realities and get-the-job-done practicality.
Premier
Brian Gallant, left, shakes the hand of then-Opposition Leader Blaine
Higgs, right, after the minority Liberal government was defeated in
2018. After the Liberals lost a confidence vote on its throne speech,
Higgs's team had to draft a one of their own. Kelly Lamrock helped draft
the speech. (James West/Canadian Press)
Enter Kelly Lamrock.
The former Liberal cabinet minister-turned-NDP candidate-turned PC adviser helped draft the speech.
"Your government seeks common cause with women and men of good faith across party lines," the speech declared with one of Lamrock's trademark rhetorical flourishes.
"New Brunswickers challenged this legislature to place province above party, to embrace shared dreams and reject old grievances," the speech said. "Rising to meet the moment means hard work, honest debate and the potential of new solutions."
Fast forward almost five years, and Lamrock's report on Policy 713 contained a similar mix of forcefully articulated principles and odes to good-faith compromises.
"There may be more common ground in this discussion than some had feared," said Lamrock, now the province's child and youth advocate.
"Each side's worst perceptions of each other have not generally been born out by the other side."
Lamrock slammed the recent changes to the policy on LGBTQ students, declaring they violated the rights of children.
But he also called on all sides in the debate to avoid divisive rhetoric.
"We are able to disagree without being disagreeable. We are able to disagree without dehumanizing those who take the other side. … We should all strive to get along."
That sentiment is a Lamrock hallmark, along with his tendency, on display again Tuesday, to mix smart-boy legalisms with a pinch of Generation-X pop culture references, leavened by displays of self-effacing humility.
At its core, his report is an offer to help rescue Higgs from legal peril over Policy 713 — and another example of how Lamrock has sought to put himself at the centre of the political action for decades.
In
October 2006, while Kelly Lamrock was serving in the Liberal cabinet as
education minister, he registered his daughter Kayleigh at Alexander
Gibson Memorial School in Fredericton, seen here. During his time as
education minister, Lamrock announced the end of early French immersion,
a move the courts eventually blocked and he compromised. (Government of New Brunswick)
"I understand the role of the politician," he said Tuesday, an understatement if there ever was one.
Lamrock has long been a big presence in New Brunswick politics, displaying sharp intelligence, tough debating skills and an almost feral appetite to play a role.
He first became prominent as the student president at the University of New Brunswick, criticizing Frank McKenna's Liberal government in 1995 for auditing student loan applicants.
His own audit and tax records were leaked to the media, earning him sympathy from government critics and name recognition.
Eight years later he ran and was elected as a Liberal — no hard feelings — and as education minister announced the end of early French immersion.
It was a Blaine Higgs-style disruption that angered many parents but that Lamrock defended aggressively and eloquently, until the courts blocked the move and he compromised.
After losing his seat in the next election, he defected to the NDP, a party that appeared to be on the rise with his longtime friend Dominic Cardy as leader.
Kelly
Lamrock announced at a 2013 news conference with then-NDP Leader
Dominic Cardy that he would be leaving the Liberals to join the NDP. As
an NDP candidate in the 2014 election, Lamrock placed fourth with less
than 20 per cent of the vote. After his friend Cardy joined the PCs,
citing his admiration for Higgs, Lamrock became an informal advisor to
the Tory leader. (CBC)
But as a New Democratic candidate in the 2014 election, Lamrock placed fourth with less than 20 per cent of the vote, marking the apparent end of his political phase.
As a lawyer in private practice, however, Lamrock took on cases that thrust him back into the arena, including a 2015 lawsuit by parents in Brown's Flat to block the Liberal closure of their school.
Lamrock argued the province failed to meet a high standard for consultations — the opposite of the position he took with his own immersion changes in 2008. He lost.
After his friend Cardy joined the PCs, citing his admiration for Higgs, Lamrock became an informal adviser to the Tory leader.
Higgs appointed him child and youth advocate in 2021, brushing off questions he was favouring him for partisan reasons.
The premier noted Lamrock had "a history in most [political] parties," but added: "Certainly he's demonstrated his capabilities … no matter what team he's on at the time."
This spring, however, Higgs appeared to regret the choice after Lamrock waded into the thick of the battle over Policy 713.
First, Lamrock called the review of Policy 713 a "broken and incoherent process" prompted by only three emails.
Then, some PC MLAs understood that Higgs had agreed the caucus could run any eventual changes past Lamrock privately and abide by whatever the child advocate decided.
But that didn't happen, and days after the changes were unveiled, Lamrock called them "shoddy and inadvertently discriminatory."
Higgs shot back that in private, Lamrock had been "more supportive than what we've seen publicly. … Yes, he had some other ideas, but not to the extent that he portrayed today."
The premier also suggested the fact Lamrock was "very close" to Cardy, who angrily quit as PC education minister over Higgs's approach to French immersion, had coloured his views.
"There are connections here we know about," Higgs said, sarcastically commenting that it was "amazing" Lamrock criticized the review so quickly after it became known.
As
a lawyer in private practice, Lamrock took on cases that thrust him
back into the arena, including a 2015 lawsuit by parents in Brown’s Flat
to block the Liberal closure of their school. (CBC/Jacques Poitras)
He had appointed Lamrock "in all good faith," he said, "and I guess I expect the best from everyone, and I expect their own individual opinions."
But if Higgs was wishing he'd chosen someone else for the position, he may yet see value in Lamrock's more detailed, exhaustively legalistic report this week.
Yes, it offers a harsh assessment of the new policy.
The changes look like they were "dreamt up in a laboratory with no contact with actual human teenagers," he said, predicting they will be found to violate the Human Rights Act, the Education Act and the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.
"The law is pretty clear. If they don't want me to tell them, the courts will."
But the document also tries to clear a path for Higgs to back down, presenting Lamrock's own proposed rewrite of the policy.
Notably, his suggestion to leave it to school principals to assess the "capacity" of students younger than 12 to request new names and pronouns is a potential exit ramp for the government.
It would be a step back from an outright ban while still nodding to the role of parents.
"Throughout this process I've remained hopeful that with careful reflection and active listening and respect for expertise, we can achieve a balanced policy that reasonable people can support," Lamrock said Tuesday.
It's classic Lamrock, a humble suggestion that there's a compromise to be had — particularly the one he is mapping out, if Higgs is willing to listen.
"Some governments put people in this job who are just not likely to call them out. I doubt that was my reputation, and even as I call them out, I think it should be noted that government chose to hire somebody like me to do this," he said.
"I always take that to mean they're coming at this in good faith and want the advice."
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Advocate says N.B.'s gender-identity policy violates children's rights
Kelly Lamrock was ordered to hold consultations on controversial Policy 713 for province's schools
Child and youth advocate Kelly Lamrock says changes to a gender-identity policy for the New Brunswick school system violate the provincial Human Rights Act, the Education Act and children's charter rights.
In June, Education Minister Bill Hogan said he changed Policy 713 on sexual orientation and gender identity to make it mandatory to deny a request from a child under 16 to use a specific name or pronoun unless parents consent.
After a review of the policy, Lamrock said Tuesday that parents do have a right to guide their children.
But the revised policy grants parents an effective "veto" on their child's identity until they're 16, and that violates children's rights to privacy, equality and accommodation, said Lamrock, who is a lawyer and former education minister.
He said children's rights can't be ignored and have to be measured against parental rights.
"The parents do not have the right to a state apparatus to force their child to live by their values," he said in a news conference.
Premier Blaine Higgs said later that he plans to read the report over the coming days.
"I'm sure at the end of it all there's a role for parents in raising their kids in every aspect," he said. "Maybe there's something in [the report] that will help us move along, but my belief in the role of parents is certainly as it has always been."
Lamrock recommended that staff verbally respect all students' pronouns without need for parental consent if they're in Grade 6 or higher.
He suggested that if children under Grade 6 request an informal name or pronoun change, it should be up to the principal to decide if the child has enough capacity to make that decision. The principal could make a plan to help the child connect to their parents, and could consult mental health professionals if in doubt, Lamrock recommends.
Child and youth advocate says gender-identity policy for schools is too vague
Changes to official records, such as report cards, for kids under 16 have always required parental consent, and Lamrock did not recommend changes to that rule.
Lamrock's recommendations are not binding, so there's no guarantee the province will change the policy as he suggested. However, he said his recommendations can provide more certainty for district education councils making their own comprehensive policies.
Hogan previously said provincial policies take precedence, but Lamrock disagrees in this case, saying Hogan's policy is vague and unclear.
"Provincial policies takes precedence where provincial policy is clear," he said. "Where a policy is vague, the districts can fill in the details.
Lamrock wrote that parents do have a right to be able to guide their children in a manner appropriate to the child's age, maturity and development. The current policy, however, in attempting to maintain parental rights, places too many limits on children's rights, he said.
In an emailed statement, Hogan said he is not ready to comment on Lamrock's findings.
"I will be taking the necessary time to review Mr. Lamrock's report and will provide further comments only after my review is complete," he said.
Parents, experts supported parental rights but not Higgs's policy
In the spring, in an opposition motion passed by the legislature, Lamrock was ordered to conduct full consultations and review the changes Hogan made to Policy 713.
Over two months, he spoke with legal, education, mental health and medical experts, as well as parents and students. He released his report Tuesday, making 24 recommendations and suggesting new wording to the policy that he said would not break the law.
Premier Blaine Higgs says new report on gender-identity policy for schools doesn’t change his position on parents’ role
Lamrock said he heard lots of support for parental rights. In fact, no one he heard from spoke against parents, he said.
"No one opposed parents playing a large or significant role," he said. "Or to be excluded or deleted in any way."
Higgs and Hogan previously said the goal of the changes was to maintain a parent's right to know what's going on with their children in school. Hogan has previously said the goal is also to give parents power to stop children from using certain pronouns.
"If a parent doesn't want their child to be referred to as they … would prefer, that's a parent's right," Hogan said on May 19. "
Lamrock said some people who were adamantly in favour of Higgs approach and parental rights paused once they understood what the current 713 actually asks teachers to do. Lamrock gave an example of a doctor who said he's in favour of the current policy, but admitted he would never deny a child's request for a specific pronoun, even if their parents requested that.
"It is not bigoted for a parent to want to know about their child's major decision," Lamrock wrote in his 90-page report. "It is not extreme to want children to have privacy and autonomy when they are mature and old enough to exercise it."
Lamrock also said some parents who didn't want the school to use their child's chosen pronouns said "the state does not own my children."
"That is absolutely true … I must add however that we as parent also don't own our children. No one owns children," Lamrock said.
Policy 'performative,''moot'
Hogan's changes made it mandatory to send children under 16 to a school psychologist or social worker if they don't want to include their parents, to come up with a plan to involve those parents.
CBC Explains: Why some schools may not even use Higgs’s Policy 713
Lamrock emphasized the response from school psychologist and social workers. Those professionals said if a child was referred to them, the first thing they'd do is respect their request to use a certain name or pronoun. They said denying the child's request would automatically bring their professional competence into question because it causes harm.
Lamrock said Hogan's policy is "somewhat performative," because it can't be followed by the professionals it mentions.
"[Its] only tangible outcome is to inflict further bureaucracy … until it's rendered moot," he said.
In addition to the parental notification changes, Hogan added a minimum requirement for universal change rooms, on top of the already-mandated universal washrooms. And he removed any reference to gender identity in the section that deals with extracurricular activities.
Lamrock's report focused on parental notification, but he did recommend that "gender identity" be added back, maintaining children's right to participate in sports teams that match how they identify.
He also recommended the policy provide guidance on accessibility and quality of private universal washrooms and change rooms.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Hadeel Ibrahim is a reporter with CBC New Brunswick based in Saint John. She reports in English and Arabic. Email: hadeel.ibrahim@cbc.ca.