MONTREAL – NDP Leader Tom Mulcair has weighed in on the controversial issue of face coverings at citizenship ceremonies, saying Wednesday he backs a requirement that women show their faces.
“Under the current rules, a woman who wears a niqab who’s seeking to become a Canadian citizen has to take off her face covering and identify herself,” Mulcair said while in Montreal.
“Those are the current rules and I fully agree with that.”
He promised to expand on the issue later in his campaign day.
The federal government is fighting a court ruling that threw out the requirement for uncovered faces. The government is seeking to take that Federal Court of Appeal decision to the Supreme Court of Canada and wants the decision stayed while it appeals.
Mulcair was also asked whether he would support a Conservative minority government.
“There isn’t a snowball’s chance in hell,” he said.
“There’s no likelihood that the NDP would ever, under any circumstances, be able to support Mr. Harper, his divisive politics, his backward economics that have left 400,000 manufacturing jobs disappear over the last few years.”
WATCH: Mulcair says NDP would ‘never, under any circumstance’ support a Harper government
That echoed a pledge from Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau, who said Tuesday there are “no circumstances” in which he would support Harper to continue being prime minister.
Mulcair joined Montreal Mayor Denis Coderre for a wide-ranging news conference, which included a reiteration of an NDP promise to reverse Canada Post’s plan to phase out door-to-door mail delivery.
That was welcome news for Coderre, who last month used a jackhammer on the concrete base of a community mailbox that the mayor said was installed without consultation.
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