The Quebec Court of Appeal ruling that stamped out any hope that 75 immigrant and anglophone children could attend an English school this year is "absolutely unfair," says the president of the province's English School Board Association.

Marcus Tabachnik said Friday there would never have been a flood of children leaving the French-language system to attend English schools if last week's Court of Appeal decision to allow easier access had been allowed to stand.

'The appeals court is the highest court in Quebec. They made a decision, and we expected them to obey that decision, the way we'd be expected to obey it.' —Marcus Tabachnik, president of the English Language School Board Association

"A thousand students out of a million students doesn't shift the balance. It doesn't change anything in terms of the differentiation of the French school boards and schools, and the English schools," Tabachnik said.

Superior Court Judge André Rochon ruled Thursday that the earlier ruling would be suspended until Quebec could appeal it to the Supreme Court, which could take years.

In making the ruling, Rochon said he considered "public order," and he wanted to avoid "administrative and legal chaos" in light of the school year just beginning.

Quebec's three main political parties all welcomed the ruling to suspend last week's judgment that would have allowed 25 Quebec families to send their children to English public schools, provided the children had attended English private schools for at least one year. That ruling went against Quebec's Charter of the French Language.

The Quebec government asked that the ruling be suspended until lawyers could argue in front of the Supreme Court, saying that upholding the ruling would open the floodgates and overwhelm the education system with transfer requests.

The Parti Québécois language critic, Pierre Curzi, said Thursday that making it easier for children to get into English school boards threatened the French language.

"It will be a very important threat against our social cohesion," he said.

Tabachnik said enrolment has gradually dropped in English schools over the past 30 years. He urged the provincial government to address that issue, and to ensure the survival of the English school system.

He said Thursday's decision will further damage the system.

"The appeals court is the highest court in Quebec. They made a decision, and we expected them to obey that decision, the way we'd be expected to obey it.

"Now, to say to the families that it could be a couple of years to know if the Supreme Court will even hear the case — it could be four or five years after that before there's a decision — is absolutely unfair," Tabachnik said.

A lawyer for the families, Brent Tyler, had to break the news to his clients at the Montreal courthouse Thursday.

"My clients are disappointed, that is evident," Tyler said, adding he expected a lengthy delay before both sides could have an audience with the Supreme Court.

"The last time we went in front of the Supreme Court in a similar case, we waited a year and a half to get a court date, and the judges deliberated for a year. In total, it lasted two and a half years," Tyler said.