A committee of Toronto District School Board trustees on Wednesday night voted to end a deal with the Confucius Institute after an outcry from a number of groups over concerns about its ties with the Chinese government.

After hearing from 10 speakers, half against the deal and half in favour — and, in a strange twist, a former Asia/Pacific chief from CSIS who warned the institutes are a “Trojan horse” — trustees debated whether they should kill the partnership or wait for more information that they requested from board staff in a report scheduled to be presented in November.

However, a late-night vote saw all but one of the committee members present approve of terminating the deal.

Their decision must still go before a vote of the full board at the end of the month.

Trustee Gerri Gershon, who voted against ending the deal, called the motion “highly unusual” and one that “flies in the face of the board decision to ask for more information” last spring.

Trustees had asked staff to report back In November on the Confucius Institute and Gershon said dissolving the partnership now “is setting the most horrible, horrible precedent.”

“I think some of this is election politics,” said Trustee Howard Kaplan, who attended the meeting but does not have a vote on the committee. “Some of us are being pressured by our constituents to vote one way or the other.”

But others argued that the issue has gone on too long and that they had heard from scores of residents who worried about the board being influenced by the Chinese government.

“We need to respect what the community tells us and the overwhelming evidence is that this is not the kind of partnership” the board should be involved in, said Trustee Cathy Dandy.

“People are tired of waiting,” said Trustee Irene Atkinson, who proposed the motion to kill the Confucius deal.

Trustee Harout Manougian noted the board already runs hundreds of Mandarin classes and does not need the help of the institute.

Since the board began preparing for the new partnership that was slated to start this fall — setting aside space at two schools with “Confucius Institute” signs outside, letting a visiting Confucius teacher from China set up a resource centre at Central Commerce — critics of China’s human rights record have voiced their opposition.

Groups such as Friends of Tibet and the Falun Gong Association organized protests outside board meetings wearing gags to represent Chinese censorship and delivered leaflets slamming the deal to homes and apartments across the city.

When other members of the Chinese community signed a petition supporting the partnership, critics suggested they were linked to the Chinese communist party and did not represent the “true voice” of Toronto’s Chinese community.

Confucius Institutes are non-profit institutions connected with the Chinese government. Their stated purpose is to promote Chinese culture and connections around the world.

While many universities use them to deliver credit courses in Chinese language and culture — and a few have cut ties with them — TDSB officials say their deal would largely support after-school heritage language and culture programs by providing student teachers from China to help with Mandarin lessons or offer enrichment programs in Chinese culture and art.

The Confucius Institute paid the TDSB $100,000 in exchange for office space at two local high schools. An institute employee has been in Toronto organizing the program since February but no others have followed, pending the board’s decision.

The Edmonton Public School board was the first in Canada to partner with the Confucius Institute as a way to get support for the board’s popular “bilingual” Chinese programs. Run in 17 schools, some 4,500 students from kindergarten to Grade 12 take half their school day in Mandarin. The Confucius Institute runs a resource centre to support these programs and provides 17 visiting instructors to help teach Mandarin and run enrichment programs in Chinese culture and art.

Some TDSB staff note having teachers from China would make activities like dance or language classes more culturally authentic for the 10,000 students who take after-hours Mandarin classes.

They said at no time would Confucius Institute teachers be able to deliver propaganda because board staff would always be present.

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But speakers said the institutes are not benign and could be used for spying purposes.

“Confucius institutes do represent a threat for the Canadian government , they do represent a threat for Canadian people,” said former CSIS agent Michel Juneau-Katsuya.

With files from Louise Brown

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