A topless protest against the Parti Québécois values charter erupted inside the Quebec legislature in a screaming, semi-nude act of defiance that derailed the daily question period Tuesday.

Women began removing their clothes while Premier Pauline Marois was answering a question.

The premier had been asked about a payroll tax and had just uttered the words, "[We're] taking action now," when shouts erupted in the gallery and everyone's eyes, including the premier's, drifted upward.

As the protesters disrobed, they chanted a slogan against the presence of the crucifix in the chamber:

"Crucifix, décalisse," they repeated, a crude, sacrilegious Québécois expression loosely translatable as, "Crucifix, get the hell out of here."

The demonstration was quelled as numerous security guards pulled a trio of still-half-naked protesters away from the chamber and struggled to dress them.

The whole affair was in reaction to the Parti Québécois's approach to state secularism, which has been described as hypocritical and uneven by its detractors.

The PQ's proposal would leave the Christian symbol looming above the chamber where Quebec's laws are passed; Christmas trees would remain in public offices; and the giant cross would stay on the public land above Montreal's Mount Royal.

That's because those Christian symbols are part of Quebec's heritage, the PQ says.

However, lower-level employees of the state would be forced to remove their hijabs, turbans, yarmulkes, and larger-than-average Christian necklaces.

If the plan does not pass the legislature in its current form, it could either be watered down, or preserved for use in the PQ's next election platform.

FEMEN claims responsibility

The group "FEMEN Quebec" claimed responsibility for the bare-breasted brouhaha.

"[We're] an organization of artists-activists fighting for democracy, for the affirmation of a Quebec identity influenced by cultural diversity, for the liberation of women from contemporary aesthetic dogma and for better communication between men and women," said a Facebook page.

It also dismissed the idea that the national assembly cross was integral to the Québécois identity.

It noted that the crucifix was only placed there under the Duplessis regime after 1936, as a symbol of the pact between his now defunct Union Nationale party and the church.

"[This] crucifix stems from the Great Darkness," the group said, employing a term commonly used to describe Maurice Duplessis's pre-Quiet Revolution Quebec.

"[It's] a painful memory, especially for women. That renewal of the pact between the church and the state is not at all a heritage worth honouring. No to a government that accepts the presence of religion at its bosom. Yes to state secularism!"