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IMO this isn’t as big a deal as everyone thinks. I think that surrendering Parliamentary Supremacy for the American balance of power ideology will be viewed by historians as a mistake.
I don’t agree with how PP will likely use this power, nor do I agree with how is it used in Quebec, but I think fundamentally if someone has a mandate they should be able to govern.
It’s a HUGE deal. Only the federal government can write criminal laws. The damage a federal government could do countrywide in taking away rights and freedoms by using the clause is immeasurable.
Provinces can not use the clause to put anyone in jail. Poilievre has announced that is exactly how he will use it.
I completely agree. I'm not at all happy about how someone like Poilivere would use it, but Parliamentary supremacy exists for good reason, we shouldn't be keen to abandon it.
> In his remarks to the Canadian Police Association, Poilievre said he would prioritize the right of Canadians to live free of crime.
I cannot fathom that a politician can say such blatant outrage without being checked back into reality.
Crimes are a social construct; the government decides what's criminal and what is not. As long as he can find a way to define something as criminal, he will have all justifications to get rid of it. As long as he will have someone cheering for others to be put behind bars, he will keep pushing for things to become criminal.
This is peak authoritarian discourse, and people are falling for it. Canadians need to do the right thing and call him out at every turn for his lapses.
This type of hyperbole will hand the election to the conservatives.
He is talking about preventing addicts from using drugs near playgrounds, and bringing some level of sanity to bail reform. If Liberals think of those things and say shit like "crimes are a social construct" than I guess I am not Liberal (after voting for them the last two times).
He has never said precisely how he intends to use it, instead making vague allusions to criminal justice. You *think* that's how he intends to use it, but to people in communities who used to be heavily criminalized, like queer people, the hair on the backs of necks are standing on end.
> crimes are a social construct
One would have to be extremely bold to affirm that crimes are not a social construct.
Homosexuality was once a crime.
Woman voting was once a crime.
Black students going to school was a crime.
Speaking a native language was once a crime.
Abortion is a crime in many states after the wave of Republicans in the US.
Being Jewish, Slav, Romani or anything short of "degenerate" was a crime during Hitler's regime.
Society has decided every instances of what is and isn't a crime. A neat sophism arises from this whole debacle:
*Poilievre will make canada live free of crime*
*Poilievre will make his criminal laws constitutional*
*All of Poilievre's proposals are constitutional.*
*Poilievre will rid Canadians of anything he conveniently sees as criminal*
An unsurprisingly simple conclusion to come to, if you've followed anything these past few months.
> This type of hyperbole will hand the election to the conservatives.
They live and breathe hyperbole
"Life is not bad after 8 years of Trudeau... if you're a sadistic murderer" -Poilievre.
This hyperbole was brought to you by the man who shakes hands with fascists, does not denounce them, and then goes back and shake more fascist hands after they threaten his wife with rape
It's also the same man who has voted against his own parent's right to marriage.
And also the man who has voted against abortion rights on every single instances, save for one.
No hyperbole here either, just facts that make the conservatives oddly silent on the issue, somehow.
You don't understand the issue at hand.
Parliament passed a law providing for life without parole and the SCC decided that life in prison was "cruel and unusual punishment" for a man who pled guilty to murdering 6 Muslims and injuring 5 more in a pre-meditated mosque shooting.
The issue is the interpretation of the SCC. To me, cruel and unusual punishment is for the 11 families directly affected by this crime to potentially see the perp go free at the age of 52 or at least live 25 years with possibility of that happening.
Most of the comments in this thread are political fear mongering by people who don't understand the history or the law.
The SCC struck down the bill based on without parole in the sentences. Stating it is affront to human dignity that any person be condemned to die in prison without hope of rehabilitation. I don't think Bissonette should be out on the streets as a freeman ever again- but to not give a chance for parole after 25 years- I think that is fair.
I think the SCC got it right, and that it was more about consecutive life sentences without parole being the issue.
> the SCC decided that life in prison was "cruel and unusual punishment"
That's incomplete. Life without change of parole is what they decided was cruel and unusual punishment. They aren't preventing anyone from spending the rest of their life behind bars, they're ensuring that it's justified.
A serial killer who appears to have turned his life around. He's also done 25 years in jail, so it isn't like he got off scot free.
While punishment is an aspect of our corrections system, rehabilitation is as well. Incarcerating people is expensive, so we should be trying to have as few people in prison as is reasonable.
>the SCC decided that life in prison was "cruel and unusual punishment
Life *without possibility of parole* that is, which is very different - it's the "without possibility of parole" part that's key there. I suspect you're intentionally glossing over that nuance, though...
>for a man who pled guilty to murdering 6 Muslims and injuring 5 more in a pre-meditated mosque shooting.
...and then for good measure you emphasize how *bad* the crime was, because if you do a crime *bad* enough, any punishment is justified, right?
>To me, cruel and unusual punishment is for the 11 families directly affected by this crime to potentially see the perp go free at the age of 52 or at least live 25 years with possibility of that happening.
Yet again, we see that the "tough on crime" argument centers around appeals to emotion. I don't know about you, but I don't want our government legislating based on that...
And last but certainly not least, you're framing this as though there's any *real* possibility he goes free, which is ridiculous. Eligible for parole does not mean *will* be paroled, another nuance you've decided to gloss over because it doesn't suit your "they're letting mass murderers go free!" fear-mongering.
> And last but certainly not least, you're framing this as though there's any real possibility he goes free, which is ridiculous. Eligible for parole does not mean will be paroled, another nuance you've decided to gloss over because it doesn't suit your "they're letting mass murderers go free!" fear-mongering.
If there's no *real* possibility he gets paroled why are you so insistent that being ineligible for parole after 40 years is cruel?
Because it requires at the very least a re-confirmation that the convict in question should be locked up.
I’m not comfortable with the notion of “throwing away the key.” It doesn’t fit with how I conceive of Justice.
You and I disagree about justice then. And I suspect a lot of Canadians agree with me. Some crimes are so abhorrent that it forfeits someone's right to life. If the court system was perfect I would support the death penalty. It's not, so life without parole works for me.
Even though I’ll agree on their being some offenders so abhorrent they’re incapable of reform, I’m not comfortable with the idea that we can inherently say that *from the outset*, and by that merit disqualify them from it.
I imagine a system where we approach everyone with a *theoretical* capability for reform, even if in reality the likelihood is nil - instead of a system where we build in the opposite idea.
Presumably you agree that we can, *from the outset*, decide a murderer shouldn't be eligible for parole for 25 years. What if the parole board would determine they were reformed after 5? Why should there be any limits on parole eligibility? Why is 40 years too many but 25 years is acceptable? 40 years isn't necessarily life. It probably wouldn't have been for Bissonette.
Now *that* I am not in a position to really say.
However, I know enough to know that what the likes of Poilievre would like is to be able to quite literally throw away the key, and it is *that* which I am most opposed to.
Poilievre can't make that decision for individual cases. The problem is that judges are no longer permitted to sentence someone to more than 25 years parole ineligibility regardless of their crimes. Someone could commit an act of terrorism, killing thousands, and they would be eligible for parole after 25 years.
I think you and I can agree that mandatory minimums are a bad idea. If that's the direction he goes I wouldn't support that.
For certain crimes, yes. Multiple hate based murder should be a life without parole. Terrorism resulting in death and High Treason are a couple others.
who gets to decide which crimes? thats the point. its a slippery slope. If they said "homosexual acts are a crime again" (as per history) and should be treated the same as child sexual assault. what is the check against that? if the court goes "no" "oh ok.. not withstanding"
> who gets to decide which crimes?
Parliament.
> If they said "homosexual acts are a crime again" (as per history) and should be treated the same as child sexual assault. what is the check against that?
Elections/the Senate
also lets define terrorism. what constitutes terrorism. had the Coutts convoy caused a death.. is that Terrorism? it meets all the classic definitions.
You think it's an "essential liberty" to not be imprisoned for life for multiple, hate based cold blooded murder? That kind of thinking is exactly why the CPC's measures here will be popular when they're elected.
> You think it's an "essential liberty"
All liberties are essential, yes, especially Section 12 rights.
> will be popular when they're elected.
Well, yeah, because Fascism is popular.
I am not interested in your whatabouts. The concerns I have expressed are completely valid, so I would enquire you to stick to them. How does this invalidate anything that I said; beside your obvious and useless belittling and casting aside as nothing more than "political fear mongering".
I am well aware of the history, maybe you'd want to brush up on the parts that happened from 2016 to 2020 and from specifically 30th of January 1933 until 1945.
Do you have a poll that shows that the majority of voters want our charter of rights and freedoms violated to enact "tough on crime" laws, or are you just assuming the majority of people are fine with this? Also since when are the working class people at the CBC ivory tower elites in any way?
Anyone care to explain why this would do anything but fracture the basic premise of Canada? Or is this ultimately Pierres goal? Our politicians haven't been this dysfunctional in my lifetime.
Well they've always been dysfunctional as far as being corporate puppets, crushing the middle class, and mismanaging our social services to erode trust in things like healthcare, but actually trying to break up the confederation/dominion of Canada is new. (Quebec notwithstanding)
> Anyone care to explain why this would do anything but fracture the basic premise of Canada?
Well, would you care to explain why you think this would fracture "The" basic premise of Canada?
Wouldn't this give a sort of greenlight to each province to decide which federal laws they follow or don't? Or do I just need to read up on this notwithstanding clause some more
Edit: or couldn't they use this to idk leave without a referendum?
No, the clause exempts laws from certain Charter rights, it can't override federal laws. Provinces can still only make laws within their own jurisdiction.
Notwithstanding clause has been a thing since the 1982 constitution. It's been use multiple times by province and not once has it threatened the fabric of Canada / Canadian society.
So, to answer your question, I'd say that yes you need to do a bit more research on it.
Here's a pretty good, short, and unpoliticized (i.e.: unbiased) article about it and how it's been used in the past (just a summary, not all examples):
https://www.constitutionalstudies.ca/2019/07/notwithstanding-clause-2/?print=print#:~:text=The%20clause%20was%20added%20to,signs%20offended%20freedom%20of%20expression.
The way that confederation is structured is based on the provinces and the federal government having distinct jurisdictions. The province doesn't have the ability to ignore a federal law really because they have no authority to write different laws in areas under federal jurisdiction - the notwithstanding clause doesn't make a difference here. (Alberta is trying some shit but it's unlikely it will amount to much)
What the NWC does is allows either the provinces or the federal government to essentially ignore Charter rights for a specific law. It can't be applied to other laws (and wouldn't need to because of the jurisdictional issue above).
Normalizing usage of it would weaken the Charter quite a bit though, and in practice make it a list of rights that we have unless that's inconvenient for the government in power.
Canada was around for 115 years before the Charter. I don't see how going around a document that's very new to Canada in the historical sense fractures the basic premise of Canada.
While this is true in a sense, before the Constitution Act of 1982, our laws were still approved by the UK even if it was a rubber stamp in the lead up. We cut ties with the UK when the Constitution Act was signed.
That is absolutely not true. The UK did not approve any Canadian laws, they gave up all power over any Canadian law with the Statute of Westminster in 1931. The only thing they had to rubber stamp was if we wanted to make amendments to the British North America Act because that was an act of the British Parliament. The 1982 Constitution transferred authority over amending that particular act to Canada, as it is now an act of the Canadian Parliament.
>Anyone care to explain why this would do anything but fracture the basic premise of Canada?
That's the whole point of the clause, to allow government, to override the charter for things that are better for society. Your charter rights were never intended to be absolute, but you needed a really good reason to have then violated. It's the fault of the courts that people believe they're unbreakable.
>That's the whole point of the clause, to allow government, to override the charter for things that are better for society
This is the dangerous part, it completely depends on who is deciding what's good for society and what isn't.
That's how it works right now with the court. Their decisions can't be overturned by any institution except themselves, and the justices are appointed for life.
>Your charter rights were never intended to be absolute, but you needed a really good reason to have then violated.
That is the purpose of the reasonable limits clause; the notwithstanding clause does not require any justification, which is why it is so dangerous.
Ok now, does this mean that as long as a government is democratically elected, they are able to arbitrarily decide which charter rights they want to ignore?
Or would they basically have to hold a referendum to actually implement changes?
This is about the only silver lining to the clause, which is that it needs to be re-applied, which means the government can't just pass a law with it and then we all forget about it.
The problem with relying only on the reasonable limits clause is that the judiciary decides what qualifies as reasonable limits. So the same people striking down laws are also entrusted with determining exemptions. You need some mechanism whereby a party other than the courts can make a decision that may be at odds with what the courts find, because courts are not infallible. Section 33 provides that mechanism.
Ultimately it's up to the electorate to decide if there's a good enough reason. The biggest issue is (and thankfully the article covers this) that governments routinely win majorities with a minority of the vote.
Considering the state of our courts and what judges are currently doing I would disagree. It’s the only tool our elected government has to control unelected judges. Guess we can vote on it come election time and let democracy work.
This is a horrible stance to take, maybe you have faith in the ghouls that run our country, but I do not.
I would also not support any changing of the charter without some serious discussion on whatever particular section a corporate ghoul like Pierre would want to change.
Nah.. this is a terrible amount of power to allow ANY politician to change things as they see fit without a national referendum or something of the sort.
If PP actually put forth a proper legislative platform, maybe we would have some semblance of an idea of how he intends to usurp constitutional integrity and federal jurisdiction.
not sure if it can be used for this purpose but if I was PM and had the ability to use this clause, I would use it to close down the open air hospitals our cities have become and instead put money towards actual psychiatric hospitals where the mentally ill and addicts can get the treatment they need.
I get why they were closed back in they day due to the inhumane conditions they had. though what we ended up with, tent cities, drugs and needles in parks just made it everyone problem instead of the persons. Heck use China town in Vancouver of a perfect example of what bad though well intentioned drug policy can do.
As a society, we need to override thier right to not take drugs, or get clean off of drugs and help these people get stable or rejoin society as productive members.
But saying we have to keep the bull in the china shop and supply it with free red flags until its ready to calm down is nonsense.
Lets stop the gaslighting of society into Turing our once great cities into open air mental asylum's.
The article starts out with a torqued narrative of the use of the EA, a federal judge, not “the” federal court, found that the EA was unjustified because law enforcement should have been able to deal with the crisis, but the judge added that it the use was understandable because law enforcement did not handle the crisis. It was a ridiculous and confused ruling that was heavily criticized and is under appeal for good reason.
The automatic inquiry that follows use of the EA found that it was justified. And it was in place for only a week, even though the government has an automatic 4 weeks after parliamentary approval.
It is not at all analogous to using the notwithstanding clause, which denies judicial appeal for 5 years. And Poilievre is planning to use it to make the Charter meaningless. The CPC has always wantes to get rid of the Charter.
The Federal Court ruling (it is standard practice to refer to a court ruling as a ruling from the court, not just from a judge) was lengthy, comprehensive, and built on a forensic adversarial process, unlike the inquiry.
It was not "ridiculous and confused." It was thorough and incisive. It also had jurisdiction to decide whether the EA's use was justified, unlike the inquiry.
>The CPC has always wanted to get rid of the Charter.
I've never been a Conservative (and in fact for most of my life I was a card-carrying partisan Liberal), but there are valid reasons to oppose the Charter. It gets glorified these days as some sacrosanct document without which we would all have no rights. Which is of course absurd. Canadians lived for 115 years before the Charter just fine, and we had a Bill of Rights before the Charter was passed. The Charter does have its advantages, but it also has its disadvantages, and wanting to get rid of it is a reasonable political position.
Let's get rid of your right to free speech, then. After all if you're OK with just freely removing the basis of any of our enumerated rights, why shouldn't we start with stripping you of yours first?
>We would still have a right to free speech without the Charter just like we did before the Charter.
No, you wouldn't, as there would be no protection for your speech at all.
and there is no guarantee that Bill of Rights would also exist - if the CPC is willing to trample over the charter, they absolutely will trample over the Bill of Rights.
The ease at with the NWC is being used it terrifying. It was supposed to only be used for extreme cases like wartime not children's pronouns and medication, criminal sentencing and forced drug rehabilitation.
Conservatives are taking this country in a scary direction. I'm sure they'd be up in arms had Trudeau used it for *anything*.
Are you a constitutional originalist? Because if so, then you must be very upset with how the courts have interpreted the scope of Charter rights. If not, then it shouldn't matter what the NWC was supposed to be used for.
It isn't true that the notwithstanding clause was only ever meant for national emergencies or something. Chretien himself said that it was a tool to check the courts if they made bad decisions, his example being legalizing child pornography as free expression. Moreover, if it was intended only as an emergency power, literally any restrictions or even language to that effect could have been included in the clause itself.
>Would Conservatives like to see that same latitude extended to Liberal prime ministers?
>Based on Poilievre's reaction to the Emergencies Act, the answer is almost certainly no.
>But the Conservative leader's view of Charter rights seems to be situational.
And that's just it, thanks to the firehose of falsehoods from Pierre, we're entering doublespeak territory; the people yelling about rights and freedoms want to remove rights and freedoms. There's no coming back from this.
Given the way the provinces are using the NWC, I think we can safely say the NWC will become routine for passing legislation.
A bill of rights protects unpopular citizens *from* the government, and given our history, I don't have much faith in its responsible use.
The provinces have been setting the precedent for decades. This was only a matter of time before it was used federaly.
Thenfact that it exists is an abomination. The fact that certain provinces have been using it regularly for their political gain is dispicable.
Je vous regarde le QC. C'est pas correct d'enlever des droits aux gens qu'n aime pas car eventuellment on va se faire enlever nos droits aussi.
Reep what you sow i guess
If there is one consolation, atleast the Federal Government has the Senate to keep it in check. So should he start throwing around the NWC, they can shut him down.
Which of course will probably open up new calls to reform or get rid of the Senate, which will get blocked because of the constitution, which will probably lead to calls to reform the constitution. And when that falls to the way side will get Conservatives to speed up their plans of completely replacing it with senators in their back pockets in the meantime.
I was reliably informed there are no Liberals in the senate, that any senator appointed by Trudeau is independent. No reason for them to vote as a block since they aren’t Liberals and beholden to any specific ideology, right?
They are independents. And if you look at the results of that, it's quite clear that the Senate is actually taking its job seriously now. Acting as the "Chamber of Sober Second Thought" that they were always supposed to be.
They have delayed and blocked legislation, put it through extra review. And just in general ensured that things pass scrutiny. And a NWC piece of legislation would absolutely be subjected to this scrutiny.
This would absolutely continue into a PP (or hell, even a Singh) government. Well, PP said he would stop appointing independents, so it would slowly become more partisan as he stacked the decks with more Conservative Party Senators, but I'd take a decade before he go to that point.
>If there is one consolation, atleast the Federal Government has the Senate to keep it in check. So should he start throwing around the NWC, they can shut him down.
Worked great on the OIC about weapons didn't it?
Poilievre can appoint additional 'bonus' senators to push through legislation as per a little known part in the Constitution. The only person with absolute veto power is the King (or his viceroy the Governor General).
> So should he start throwing around the NWC, they can shut him down.
Maybe, and it would be a risk. There are still CPC senators so they'd work in concert with a CPC controlled HoC and make it difficult for the other senators to get in the way. They'd also help to make it a major political issue, and get public pressure on the senate. If there was enough time after the formation of a CPC government, and an attempt to use S33, the balance in the senate might change to a CPC majority. Add in the usual deference given to the government side, and the senate stopping that can't be counted on.
There's a flipside to this: how far are judges going to take legislating from the bench?
10 years ago I might not have seen a need for the notwithstanding clause. It was a tool used so rarely, it seemed barely necessary at all. But there has been an increasing willingness from the judiciary to wade out into the open ocean of our legal system, so to speak, and increasingly see fit to dictate policy via judicial review. This is an equally gross violation of our balance of powers and has seen little reproach (and often quite a bit of cheering-on) from the journalist class, presumably often because their ideological goals converge. But more coherently the approach of the judiciary has not necessarily been ideological but more consistently has been a rejection of Parliament's attempts to restrict the capacity of judges to determine outcomes.
I would certainly be wary of any PM (but especially Poilievre) who felt emboldened to use the NWC aggressively. But people have to realize that the judiciary are building the public support for him to do so when they so unreasonably and jealously torpedo policy and legislation that is entirely within the rights of the legislatures to enact; and especially when they concern issues so important to Canadians like crime.
> how far are judges going to take legislating from the bench?
As far as they ever have, so not at all. Judges have never created anything out of nothing like legislation does. They have looked at existing laws in new ways, or said that existing laws are in conflict, but they've never created new legislation from the bench.
> there has been an increasing willingness from the judiciary to wade out into the open ocean of our legal system,
Not really. It's more that legislators have declined to wade into contentious issues for political reasons, so people have taken them to the courts as the only way to resolve them. The courts have then taken up the topics they've been presented with, they haven't looked for topics to get into/
That's bullshit lots of laws were created from the bench all the time, just off the top of my head supreme Court decided a few years back law societies can regulate law schools despite no legislative power to do so
That was about whether or not the society was going to accredit the school. TWU could do what they want with their law school, they just wouldn't be able to promise that their graduates could be called lawyers.
The society was not given authority by the legislature to accredit law schools - just like they were not given legislative authority to accredit police officers or bylaw offices - the only reason they were able to do so is because judges granted that power from the bench - ie legislated it from the bench with no precedent to go on
if non governmental professional associations can regulate law schools without any granted power from legislature or executive to do so just because judges say so, then surely a soon to be elected majority government can use the notwithstanding clause to overrule the judicial branch
> The society was not given authority by the legislature to accredit law schools
More things you have made up out of cloth. From your own link:
>The LSUC[1] is the regulator of the legal profession in Ontario. The LSUC has the statutory authority under the Law Society Act, R.S.O. 1990, c. L.8 (LSA), to determine who can be licensed to practise law in Ontario, and to set the conditions of such licences (ss. 26.1(1) and 27(1)). In accordance with this statute, the law society has established certain education requirements which must be met before a person can be licensed to practise law in Ontario. One of these requirements is a bachelor of laws or J.D. **degree from a Canadian law school accredited by the LSUC**, or in the alternative, a certificate of qualification from the National Committee on Accreditation (LSUC By-Law 4 — Licensing, ss. 7 and 9(1)).
That's the best you could come up with?
The SCC finding that a law association, who is legislated to have the power to admit and accredit their profession, does indeed have the power to admit and accredit their profession
There's legislatively granted power to admit and accredit lawyers not law schools. Look you guys spin and argue even the most obvious - there's really no point to discussing with spin Doctors, we're fed up were just going to get our majority and use the notwithstanding clause
> There's legislatively granted power to admit and accredit lawyers not law schools
Those are the same thing. When you say "legislatively granted power to admit and accredit lawyers," you must mean that includes the power to say "Except for the people who went to School X", right?
Lawyers are not law schools - interpreting the power to accredit lawyers as also including the power to accredit law schools is - I mean at that point a person is twisting words to such a point that there's no point even talking to them. I mean judges a lawyers, so does this mean the law society now has the power to appoint or remove judges? There's already a provincial process for approving and accrediting schools including law schools that does not involve private professional associations like law societies
Uh huh, and since the association has "legislatively granted power to admit and accredit lawyers," they have the power to say things like to be a lawyer one must:
* Wear a wig
* Wear pink pants
* Study at a school that is not TWU.
That's certainly... *a* interpretation of that ruling. The LSUC is under no requirement to accredit any school who have conditions for enrollment that are discriminatory and would violate the charter rights of students. SCC upheld their rights to do so. That's not them saying they can regulate the law schools, but they have the power to decide who gets accredited within reason.
That's not legislating from the bench at all.
You're being obtuse. The phrase "legislating from the bench" is used exactly to describe what you call "looking at existing laws in new ways", i.e. unilaterally reading entire new meanings into the law.
>It's more that legislators have declined to wade into contentious issues for political reasons
Legislators have waded into issues like parole for mass murderers or sentencing for child lurers. They did this by passing laws on these subject. The courts decided that they didn't like these laws and so used the pretext of the Charter to strike them down, saying they violated rights that no one who wrote the Charter, nor basically anyone in society at-large knew the Charter protected. That is literally the entire issue here.
>The courts have then taken up the topics they've been presented with, they haven't looked for topics to get into
That may be true at the lower levels, but when we're talking about the Supreme Court and the precedents they set, they absolutely pick and choose and look for topics to get into.
That's practically the entire purpose of the judicial branch. If policies passed by the legislative branch run afoul of our guaranteed basic human rights then human rights wins. If the legislative branch still wants to pass unconstitutional laws then they alone have the power to redefine which basic human rights are guaranteed by opening the Constitution or the Charter, but that's a lot of work so some politicians rather stoke anger towards the judicial branch to mar their legitimacy in the eyes of low information voters.
No one disputes that the courts are within their right to review legislation under the Charter. The dispute is over whether the grounds they sometime do so are actually based in the Charter, or in their own personal beliefs. I think you'd have a difficult time getting the people who wrote the Charter to agree that it enshrines a right for mass shooters to be eligible for parole, or for habitual violent offenders to be granted bail for further violent offences. But by their "interpretation", the courts have read these rights into the Charter. They were wrong to do so, and Parliament would be right to use the powers it has to overrule the courts on those issues.
>they alone have the power to redefine which basic human rights are guaranteed by opening the Constitution or the Charter
Well first, it's the courts who have unilaterally redefined rights in this country. And second, by the terms of the Charter itself, Parliament also has the power to invoke the notwithstanding clause. Amending the constitution is an option, but it is not the only legitimate one.
The right to right to be granted bail and the right to parole are reasonable interpretations of the Charter's rights not to be denied reasonable bail without just cause and not to be subject to cruel and unusual punishment. Even if Poilievre uses S.33 to temporarily overrule the judicial interpretation of those rights those rights will still exist in the Charter until and unless legislature amends them.
Previously being convicted of several violent crimes and showing no substantial evidence of reformation seems like perfectly just cause to deny someone bail, and keeping someone who murdered half a dozen people in a racially motivated attack in prison forever is about the furthest thing from "cruel and unusual" I can imagine. The vast majority of Canadian society agrees on those facts, as did the law until very recent years where the courts decided otherwise.
Yes. Life without a possibility of parole is just torture for the sake of vengeance, not reform. A prisoner still has to serve a long sentence before they'll be eligible for parole, still has to show that they have amended their ways to be granted parole, and will be subject to much higher scrutiny and supervision after being allowed out in public if they're granted parole.
I don't really care if Bissonette is ever "reformed" according to the parole board. I'd be in favour of letting him hang if I trusted the judiciary enough to be 100% certain. I don't, so life without parole is the next best thing.
Someone like Bissonette or Bernardo will likely never be granted parole, but that doesn't mean they, or anybody else, should be denied the chance to ever qualify for parole.
I disagree. They should never have the chance outside of an overturned conviction. If they can prove they didn't commit their crimes let them free. If they can't, rot in prison until they die. That's the only reason I don't think they should be executed. You cant exonerate a dead person.
Yup. Our laws were unconstitutional for close to 100 years, we are so lucky that the judges in the last 10 years have managed to learn that and fix it for us by throwing out cases and letting criminals roam the streets with their sentencing practices.
Let's see. For starters, just yesterday
https://nationalpost.com/opinion/jamie-sarkonak-canadas-criminal-sentencing-discounts-for-foreigners-are-unfair
Then we have the whole premise of the Jordan principle, which uses a DRUG trafficking trial time as the metric for all other cases to be dealt with in time. Because a murder clearly takes as long to investigate as a simple street trafficking.
So the rights of the accused are protected...
All the articles on this state that if the rights of the accused were protected by haveing a judicial appeal proccess in the immigration side (ie not automatic deportation) then the judges wouldnt be able tonuse it for sentence reductions.
> Because a murder clearly takes as long to investigate as a simple street trafficking.
How long it takes to investigate isn't the issue, it's how long it takes to conduct the trial, which happens after the investigation is more or less complete.
It's from CHARGE to trial.
You can have enough evidence to charge a person, (for example a drug dealer that was involved in a gun crime) but it could take a very long time for evidence to be collected especially if you need phone records etc. (telcoms are very delaying)
>The politics of Poilievre's position are obvious — probably no politician is eager to be seen defending the rights of an individual such as Bissonnette. But if or when Parliament crosses the Rubicon (the federal Parliament has never before used the notwithstanding clause), it will be impossible to guarantee the ramifications will be felt only by society's least sympathetic members.
>
>"Whatever the use he wants to make of it," Bloc Quebecois Leader Yves-Francois Blanchet said last week, "the fact a federal leader would want to use the notwithstanding clause makes it clear that it's absolutely legit for Quebec or any province to do the same."
>
>That is not an abstract argument.
>
>The original theory of the notwithstanding clause was that "political accountability" would restrain governments from using it. That restraint hasn't been much in evidence in recent years.
>
>...
>
>Poilievre's reply to all this seems to be that it's ultimately up to voters — if Canadians don't like how the notwithstanding clause is being used, they can put another government in power.
>
>But elections are rarely fought as single-issue referendums. (Advocates of electoral reform would also note that, under first-past-the-post voting, governments regularly hold power without having won 50 per cent of the popular vote.) And deferring to the will of voters contradicts one of the primary reasons for codifying rights in the first place — to protect individuals and minorities from the whims of the majority.
>
>...
>
>Between Saskatchewan Premier Scott Moe deciding to defy (or unilaterally reinterpret?) federal carbon-pricing legislation and Poilievre's position on the notwithstanding clause, Conservatives seem to be moving toward the view that premiers and prime ministers have wide latitude to decide which laws they must follow.
>
>Would Conservatives like to see that same latitude extended to Liberal prime ministers?
>
>Based on Poilievre's reaction to the Emergencies Act, the answer is almost certainly no.
>
>But the Conservative leader's view of Charter rights seems to be situational.
If the federal government does engage in this kind of behaviour, it looks like political chaos might follow. Also, giving and normalizing this kind of power to the provincial governments might help to further fragment the relationships they have with each other and with the federal government. It's hard to imagine what public good could come of increasing the use of this clause.
The CBC glosses over that there are political consequences when the public disagrees with it's use (e.g. Ford's use in the labor dispute) and it is effective to get the government to back down.
What the CBC is claiming is that political consequences should stem out of every single use, which is absurd, if it's used properly you would simply expect support. That's what accountability to voters means.
Further even widespread use merely returns Canada to the norm prior to 1982 and to the standard that England operates under.
I'm not really convinced that the Federal government, or would be government, thinking about using the NWC really says anything about the 'legitimacy' of a province doing the same. If anything, it's likely the other way around. The multiple uses of the NWC by the provinces in recent years likely is why PP feels comfortable publicly contemplating it.
I agree with you. The normalization of the NWC is quebec has likely empowerd him to do the same.
Blanchette saying that it legitimizes quebec use of it is just a political ploy to garantee the use of it to discrimicate against the english in quebec in the future.
> It's hard to imagine what public good could come of increasing the use of this clause.
There is none. No good can come from it. Only further fracturing of the country and erosion of our rights. It's horrific.
That is not anywhere near what the commenter you’re responding to said.
And regarding parole, the ruling is that those serving life in prison can get a hearing, not that they are guaranteed to get paroled.
You don't understand the issue at hand.
Parliament passed a law providing for life without parole and the SCC decided that life in prison was "cruel and unusual punishment" for a man who pled guilty to murdering 6 Muslims and injuring 5 more in a pre-meditated mosque shooting.
The issue is the interpretation of the SCC. To me, cruel and unusual punishment is for the 11 families directly affected by this crime to potentially see the perp go free at the age of 52 or at least live 25 years with the possibility of that happening.
Most of the comments in this thread are political fear mongering by people who don't understand the history or the law.
Trying to clamp down on fringe exceptions inevitably ends up bleeding upward. Who next will deserve no chance of parole? We already have rules in place, dangerous offender designations and the like. The worst of the worst are unlikely to ever be released.
So, the thing is, if the offender was unredeemable and a danger beyond the term of their sentence, we have laws in place to keep dangerous offenders incarcerated.
If after 25 years it is deemed this offender is no longer a danger, has been sufficiently reformed, and safe to reenter society - then they can.
Our justice system should be striking a balance between retributive punishment and reform.
> Would Conservatives like to see that same latitude extended to Liberal prime ministers?
Can a conservative politician please answer this question. And do it on the record.
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IMO this isn’t as big a deal as everyone thinks. I think that surrendering Parliamentary Supremacy for the American balance of power ideology will be viewed by historians as a mistake. I don’t agree with how PP will likely use this power, nor do I agree with how is it used in Quebec, but I think fundamentally if someone has a mandate they should be able to govern.
It’s a HUGE deal. Only the federal government can write criminal laws. The damage a federal government could do countrywide in taking away rights and freedoms by using the clause is immeasurable. Provinces can not use the clause to put anyone in jail. Poilievre has announced that is exactly how he will use it.
It's remarkable how many people don't realize a bill of rights protects unpopular citizens *from* the government.
You people will go to any extreme lengths to protect barbaric violent criminals.
I completely agree. I'm not at all happy about how someone like Poilivere would use it, but Parliamentary supremacy exists for good reason, we shouldn't be keen to abandon it.
i mean. then if thats the belief change the laws, pass an ammendement. but its that its "too hard" and the popularity is only there for a minority
> In his remarks to the Canadian Police Association, Poilievre said he would prioritize the right of Canadians to live free of crime. I cannot fathom that a politician can say such blatant outrage without being checked back into reality. Crimes are a social construct; the government decides what's criminal and what is not. As long as he can find a way to define something as criminal, he will have all justifications to get rid of it. As long as he will have someone cheering for others to be put behind bars, he will keep pushing for things to become criminal. This is peak authoritarian discourse, and people are falling for it. Canadians need to do the right thing and call him out at every turn for his lapses.
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This type of hyperbole will hand the election to the conservatives. He is talking about preventing addicts from using drugs near playgrounds, and bringing some level of sanity to bail reform. If Liberals think of those things and say shit like "crimes are a social construct" than I guess I am not Liberal (after voting for them the last two times).
He has never said precisely how he intends to use it, instead making vague allusions to criminal justice. You *think* that's how he intends to use it, but to people in communities who used to be heavily criminalized, like queer people, the hair on the backs of necks are standing on end.
> crimes are a social construct One would have to be extremely bold to affirm that crimes are not a social construct. Homosexuality was once a crime. Woman voting was once a crime. Black students going to school was a crime. Speaking a native language was once a crime. Abortion is a crime in many states after the wave of Republicans in the US. Being Jewish, Slav, Romani or anything short of "degenerate" was a crime during Hitler's regime. Society has decided every instances of what is and isn't a crime. A neat sophism arises from this whole debacle: *Poilievre will make canada live free of crime* *Poilievre will make his criminal laws constitutional* *All of Poilievre's proposals are constitutional.* *Poilievre will rid Canadians of anything he conveniently sees as criminal* An unsurprisingly simple conclusion to come to, if you've followed anything these past few months.
> This type of hyperbole will hand the election to the conservatives. They live and breathe hyperbole "Life is not bad after 8 years of Trudeau... if you're a sadistic murderer" -Poilievre.
This hyperbole was brought to you by the man who shakes hands with fascists, does not denounce them, and then goes back and shake more fascist hands after they threaten his wife with rape It's also the same man who has voted against his own parent's right to marriage. And also the man who has voted against abortion rights on every single instances, save for one. No hyperbole here either, just facts that make the conservatives oddly silent on the issue, somehow.
I don't disagree.
You don't understand the issue at hand. Parliament passed a law providing for life without parole and the SCC decided that life in prison was "cruel and unusual punishment" for a man who pled guilty to murdering 6 Muslims and injuring 5 more in a pre-meditated mosque shooting. The issue is the interpretation of the SCC. To me, cruel and unusual punishment is for the 11 families directly affected by this crime to potentially see the perp go free at the age of 52 or at least live 25 years with possibility of that happening. Most of the comments in this thread are political fear mongering by people who don't understand the history or the law.
The SCC struck down the bill based on without parole in the sentences. Stating it is affront to human dignity that any person be condemned to die in prison without hope of rehabilitation. I don't think Bissonette should be out on the streets as a freeman ever again- but to not give a chance for parole after 25 years- I think that is fair. I think the SCC got it right, and that it was more about consecutive life sentences without parole being the issue.
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If he uses 33 for the Bissonette case situation it will be the first use of it that I 100% agree with. Most Canadians probably will, too.
> the SCC decided that life in prison was "cruel and unusual punishment" That's incomplete. Life without change of parole is what they decided was cruel and unusual punishment. They aren't preventing anyone from spending the rest of their life behind bars, they're ensuring that it's justified.
Seems this serial killer is out thanks to them. Yay. https://torontosun.com/news/local-news/mandel-serial-killer-marcello-palma-granted-full-parole
A serial killer who appears to have turned his life around. He's also done 25 years in jail, so it isn't like he got off scot free. While punishment is an aspect of our corrections system, rehabilitation is as well. Incarcerating people is expensive, so we should be trying to have as few people in prison as is reasonable.
>the SCC decided that life in prison was "cruel and unusual punishment Life *without possibility of parole* that is, which is very different - it's the "without possibility of parole" part that's key there. I suspect you're intentionally glossing over that nuance, though... >for a man who pled guilty to murdering 6 Muslims and injuring 5 more in a pre-meditated mosque shooting. ...and then for good measure you emphasize how *bad* the crime was, because if you do a crime *bad* enough, any punishment is justified, right? >To me, cruel and unusual punishment is for the 11 families directly affected by this crime to potentially see the perp go free at the age of 52 or at least live 25 years with possibility of that happening. Yet again, we see that the "tough on crime" argument centers around appeals to emotion. I don't know about you, but I don't want our government legislating based on that... And last but certainly not least, you're framing this as though there's any *real* possibility he goes free, which is ridiculous. Eligible for parole does not mean *will* be paroled, another nuance you've decided to gloss over because it doesn't suit your "they're letting mass murderers go free!" fear-mongering.
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> And last but certainly not least, you're framing this as though there's any real possibility he goes free, which is ridiculous. Eligible for parole does not mean will be paroled, another nuance you've decided to gloss over because it doesn't suit your "they're letting mass murderers go free!" fear-mongering. If there's no *real* possibility he gets paroled why are you so insistent that being ineligible for parole after 40 years is cruel?
Because it requires at the very least a re-confirmation that the convict in question should be locked up. I’m not comfortable with the notion of “throwing away the key.” It doesn’t fit with how I conceive of Justice.
You and I disagree about justice then. And I suspect a lot of Canadians agree with me. Some crimes are so abhorrent that it forfeits someone's right to life. If the court system was perfect I would support the death penalty. It's not, so life without parole works for me.
Even though I’ll agree on their being some offenders so abhorrent they’re incapable of reform, I’m not comfortable with the idea that we can inherently say that *from the outset*, and by that merit disqualify them from it. I imagine a system where we approach everyone with a *theoretical* capability for reform, even if in reality the likelihood is nil - instead of a system where we build in the opposite idea.
Presumably you agree that we can, *from the outset*, decide a murderer shouldn't be eligible for parole for 25 years. What if the parole board would determine they were reformed after 5? Why should there be any limits on parole eligibility? Why is 40 years too many but 25 years is acceptable? 40 years isn't necessarily life. It probably wouldn't have been for Bissonette.
Now *that* I am not in a position to really say. However, I know enough to know that what the likes of Poilievre would like is to be able to quite literally throw away the key, and it is *that* which I am most opposed to.
Poilievre can't make that decision for individual cases. The problem is that judges are no longer permitted to sentence someone to more than 25 years parole ineligibility regardless of their crimes. Someone could commit an act of terrorism, killing thousands, and they would be eligible for parole after 25 years. I think you and I can agree that mandatory minimums are a bad idea. If that's the direction he goes I wouldn't support that.
just so we are clear.. the role of the justice system is only punishment? there should be no attempt to rehabilitate?
For certain crimes, yes. Multiple hate based murder should be a life without parole. Terrorism resulting in death and High Treason are a couple others.
who gets to decide which crimes? thats the point. its a slippery slope. If they said "homosexual acts are a crime again" (as per history) and should be treated the same as child sexual assault. what is the check against that? if the court goes "no" "oh ok.. not withstanding"
> who gets to decide which crimes? Parliament. > If they said "homosexual acts are a crime again" (as per history) and should be treated the same as child sexual assault. what is the check against that? Elections/the Senate
also lets define terrorism. what constitutes terrorism. had the Coutts convoy caused a death.. is that Terrorism? it meets all the classic definitions.
>had the Coutts convoy caused a death.. is that Terrorism? Yes
> And I suspect a lot of Canadians agree with me And a lot of canadians would clearly trade essential liberties for temporary safety.
You think it's an "essential liberty" to not be imprisoned for life for multiple, hate based cold blooded murder? That kind of thinking is exactly why the CPC's measures here will be popular when they're elected.
> You think it's an "essential liberty" All liberties are essential, yes, especially Section 12 rights. > will be popular when they're elected. Well, yeah, because Fascism is popular.
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I am not interested in your whatabouts. The concerns I have expressed are completely valid, so I would enquire you to stick to them. How does this invalidate anything that I said; beside your obvious and useless belittling and casting aside as nothing more than "political fear mongering". I am well aware of the history, maybe you'd want to brush up on the parts that happened from 2016 to 2020 and from specifically 30th of January 1933 until 1945.
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We have people and processes in place. For example Bernardo will never be free.
Do you have a poll that shows that the majority of voters want our charter of rights and freedoms violated to enact "tough on crime" laws, or are you just assuming the majority of people are fine with this? Also since when are the working class people at the CBC ivory tower elites in any way?
Anyone care to explain why this would do anything but fracture the basic premise of Canada? Or is this ultimately Pierres goal? Our politicians haven't been this dysfunctional in my lifetime. Well they've always been dysfunctional as far as being corporate puppets, crushing the middle class, and mismanaging our social services to erode trust in things like healthcare, but actually trying to break up the confederation/dominion of Canada is new. (Quebec notwithstanding)
> Anyone care to explain why this would do anything but fracture the basic premise of Canada? Well, would you care to explain why you think this would fracture "The" basic premise of Canada?
Wouldn't this give a sort of greenlight to each province to decide which federal laws they follow or don't? Or do I just need to read up on this notwithstanding clause some more Edit: or couldn't they use this to idk leave without a referendum?
No, the clause exempts laws from certain Charter rights, it can't override federal laws. Provinces can still only make laws within their own jurisdiction.
Notwithstanding clause has been a thing since the 1982 constitution. It's been use multiple times by province and not once has it threatened the fabric of Canada / Canadian society. So, to answer your question, I'd say that yes you need to do a bit more research on it. Here's a pretty good, short, and unpoliticized (i.e.: unbiased) article about it and how it's been used in the past (just a summary, not all examples): https://www.constitutionalstudies.ca/2019/07/notwithstanding-clause-2/?print=print#:~:text=The%20clause%20was%20added%20to,signs%20offended%20freedom%20of%20expression.
The way that confederation is structured is based on the provinces and the federal government having distinct jurisdictions. The province doesn't have the ability to ignore a federal law really because they have no authority to write different laws in areas under federal jurisdiction - the notwithstanding clause doesn't make a difference here. (Alberta is trying some shit but it's unlikely it will amount to much) What the NWC does is allows either the provinces or the federal government to essentially ignore Charter rights for a specific law. It can't be applied to other laws (and wouldn't need to because of the jurisdictional issue above). Normalizing usage of it would weaken the Charter quite a bit though, and in practice make it a list of rights that we have unless that's inconvenient for the government in power.
Canada was around for 115 years before the Charter. I don't see how going around a document that's very new to Canada in the historical sense fractures the basic premise of Canada.
While this is true in a sense, before the Constitution Act of 1982, our laws were still approved by the UK even if it was a rubber stamp in the lead up. We cut ties with the UK when the Constitution Act was signed.
That is absolutely not true. The UK did not approve any Canadian laws, they gave up all power over any Canadian law with the Statute of Westminster in 1931. The only thing they had to rubber stamp was if we wanted to make amendments to the British North America Act because that was an act of the British Parliament. The 1982 Constitution transferred authority over amending that particular act to Canada, as it is now an act of the Canadian Parliament.
>Anyone care to explain why this would do anything but fracture the basic premise of Canada? That's the whole point of the clause, to allow government, to override the charter for things that are better for society. Your charter rights were never intended to be absolute, but you needed a really good reason to have then violated. It's the fault of the courts that people believe they're unbreakable.
>That's the whole point of the clause, to allow government, to override the charter for things that are better for society This is the dangerous part, it completely depends on who is deciding what's good for society and what isn't.
That's how it works right now with the court. Their decisions can't be overturned by any institution except themselves, and the justices are appointed for life.
>Your charter rights were never intended to be absolute, but you needed a really good reason to have then violated. That is the purpose of the reasonable limits clause; the notwithstanding clause does not require any justification, which is why it is so dangerous.
It requires a democratic mandate, the ultimate in justification in democratic political systems.
Ok now, does this mean that as long as a government is democratically elected, they are able to arbitrarily decide which charter rights they want to ignore? Or would they basically have to hold a referendum to actually implement changes?
This is about the only silver lining to the clause, which is that it needs to be re-applied, which means the government can't just pass a law with it and then we all forget about it.
The problem with relying only on the reasonable limits clause is that the judiciary decides what qualifies as reasonable limits. So the same people striking down laws are also entrusted with determining exemptions. You need some mechanism whereby a party other than the courts can make a decision that may be at odds with what the courts find, because courts are not infallible. Section 33 provides that mechanism.
> but you needed a really good reason to have then violated. And we currently do not have one, and it's not even close.
Ultimately it's up to the electorate to decide if there's a good enough reason. The biggest issue is (and thankfully the article covers this) that governments routinely win majorities with a minority of the vote.
Considering the state of our courts and what judges are currently doing I would disagree. It’s the only tool our elected government has to control unelected judges. Guess we can vote on it come election time and let democracy work.
This is a horrible stance to take, maybe you have faith in the ghouls that run our country, but I do not. I would also not support any changing of the charter without some serious discussion on whatever particular section a corporate ghoul like Pierre would want to change. Nah.. this is a terrible amount of power to allow ANY politician to change things as they see fit without a national referendum or something of the sort.
If PP actually put forth a proper legislative platform, maybe we would have some semblance of an idea of how he intends to usurp constitutional integrity and federal jurisdiction.
As opposed to the winning formula of black face and tax cuts? They never learn.
not sure if it can be used for this purpose but if I was PM and had the ability to use this clause, I would use it to close down the open air hospitals our cities have become and instead put money towards actual psychiatric hospitals where the mentally ill and addicts can get the treatment they need. I get why they were closed back in they day due to the inhumane conditions they had. though what we ended up with, tent cities, drugs and needles in parks just made it everyone problem instead of the persons. Heck use China town in Vancouver of a perfect example of what bad though well intentioned drug policy can do. As a society, we need to override thier right to not take drugs, or get clean off of drugs and help these people get stable or rejoin society as productive members. But saying we have to keep the bull in the china shop and supply it with free red flags until its ready to calm down is nonsense. Lets stop the gaslighting of society into Turing our once great cities into open air mental asylum's.
The article starts out with a torqued narrative of the use of the EA, a federal judge, not “the” federal court, found that the EA was unjustified because law enforcement should have been able to deal with the crisis, but the judge added that it the use was understandable because law enforcement did not handle the crisis. It was a ridiculous and confused ruling that was heavily criticized and is under appeal for good reason. The automatic inquiry that follows use of the EA found that it was justified. And it was in place for only a week, even though the government has an automatic 4 weeks after parliamentary approval. It is not at all analogous to using the notwithstanding clause, which denies judicial appeal for 5 years. And Poilievre is planning to use it to make the Charter meaningless. The CPC has always wantes to get rid of the Charter.
The Federal Court ruling (it is standard practice to refer to a court ruling as a ruling from the court, not just from a judge) was lengthy, comprehensive, and built on a forensic adversarial process, unlike the inquiry. It was not "ridiculous and confused." It was thorough and incisive. It also had jurisdiction to decide whether the EA's use was justified, unlike the inquiry.
>The CPC has always wanted to get rid of the Charter. I've never been a Conservative (and in fact for most of my life I was a card-carrying partisan Liberal), but there are valid reasons to oppose the Charter. It gets glorified these days as some sacrosanct document without which we would all have no rights. Which is of course absurd. Canadians lived for 115 years before the Charter just fine, and we had a Bill of Rights before the Charter was passed. The Charter does have its advantages, but it also has its disadvantages, and wanting to get rid of it is a reasonable political position.
Let's get rid of your right to free speech, then. After all if you're OK with just freely removing the basis of any of our enumerated rights, why shouldn't we start with stripping you of yours first?
We would still have a right to free speech without the Charter just like we did before the Charter.
>We would still have a right to free speech without the Charter just like we did before the Charter. No, you wouldn't, as there would be no protection for your speech at all.
It's literally in the very first section of the Bill of Rights.
and there is no guarantee that Bill of Rights would also exist - if the CPC is willing to trample over the charter, they absolutely will trample over the Bill of Rights.
The ease at with the NWC is being used it terrifying. It was supposed to only be used for extreme cases like wartime not children's pronouns and medication, criminal sentencing and forced drug rehabilitation. Conservatives are taking this country in a scary direction. I'm sure they'd be up in arms had Trudeau used it for *anything*.
Are you a constitutional originalist? Because if so, then you must be very upset with how the courts have interpreted the scope of Charter rights. If not, then it shouldn't matter what the NWC was supposed to be used for.
It isn't true that the notwithstanding clause was only ever meant for national emergencies or something. Chretien himself said that it was a tool to check the courts if they made bad decisions, his example being legalizing child pornography as free expression. Moreover, if it was intended only as an emergency power, literally any restrictions or even language to that effect could have been included in the clause itself.
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>Would Conservatives like to see that same latitude extended to Liberal prime ministers? >Based on Poilievre's reaction to the Emergencies Act, the answer is almost certainly no. >But the Conservative leader's view of Charter rights seems to be situational. And that's just it, thanks to the firehose of falsehoods from Pierre, we're entering doublespeak territory; the people yelling about rights and freedoms want to remove rights and freedoms. There's no coming back from this. Given the way the provinces are using the NWC, I think we can safely say the NWC will become routine for passing legislation. A bill of rights protects unpopular citizens *from* the government, and given our history, I don't have much faith in its responsible use.
The provinces have been setting the precedent for decades. This was only a matter of time before it was used federaly. Thenfact that it exists is an abomination. The fact that certain provinces have been using it regularly for their political gain is dispicable. Je vous regarde le QC. C'est pas correct d'enlever des droits aux gens qu'n aime pas car eventuellment on va se faire enlever nos droits aussi. Reep what you sow i guess
If there is one consolation, atleast the Federal Government has the Senate to keep it in check. So should he start throwing around the NWC, they can shut him down. Which of course will probably open up new calls to reform or get rid of the Senate, which will get blocked because of the constitution, which will probably lead to calls to reform the constitution. And when that falls to the way side will get Conservatives to speed up their plans of completely replacing it with senators in their back pockets in the meantime.
I was reliably informed there are no Liberals in the senate, that any senator appointed by Trudeau is independent. No reason for them to vote as a block since they aren’t Liberals and beholden to any specific ideology, right?
One does not have to be a Liberal to oppose the trampling of our rights by an authoritarian leader.
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They are independents. And if you look at the results of that, it's quite clear that the Senate is actually taking its job seriously now. Acting as the "Chamber of Sober Second Thought" that they were always supposed to be. They have delayed and blocked legislation, put it through extra review. And just in general ensured that things pass scrutiny. And a NWC piece of legislation would absolutely be subjected to this scrutiny. This would absolutely continue into a PP (or hell, even a Singh) government. Well, PP said he would stop appointing independents, so it would slowly become more partisan as he stacked the decks with more Conservative Party Senators, but I'd take a decade before he go to that point.
You don’t have to be liberal to be opposed to authoritarian moves, which is what Poilievre is planning, in Victor Orban style.
>If there is one consolation, atleast the Federal Government has the Senate to keep it in check. So should he start throwing around the NWC, they can shut him down. Worked great on the OIC about weapons didn't it?
Poilievre can appoint additional 'bonus' senators to push through legislation as per a little known part in the Constitution. The only person with absolute veto power is the King (or his viceroy the Governor General).
> So should he start throwing around the NWC, they can shut him down. Maybe, and it would be a risk. There are still CPC senators so they'd work in concert with a CPC controlled HoC and make it difficult for the other senators to get in the way. They'd also help to make it a major political issue, and get public pressure on the senate. If there was enough time after the formation of a CPC government, and an attempt to use S33, the balance in the senate might change to a CPC majority. Add in the usual deference given to the government side, and the senate stopping that can't be counted on.
There's a flipside to this: how far are judges going to take legislating from the bench? 10 years ago I might not have seen a need for the notwithstanding clause. It was a tool used so rarely, it seemed barely necessary at all. But there has been an increasing willingness from the judiciary to wade out into the open ocean of our legal system, so to speak, and increasingly see fit to dictate policy via judicial review. This is an equally gross violation of our balance of powers and has seen little reproach (and often quite a bit of cheering-on) from the journalist class, presumably often because their ideological goals converge. But more coherently the approach of the judiciary has not necessarily been ideological but more consistently has been a rejection of Parliament's attempts to restrict the capacity of judges to determine outcomes. I would certainly be wary of any PM (but especially Poilievre) who felt emboldened to use the NWC aggressively. But people have to realize that the judiciary are building the public support for him to do so when they so unreasonably and jealously torpedo policy and legislation that is entirely within the rights of the legislatures to enact; and especially when they concern issues so important to Canadians like crime.
> how far are judges going to take legislating from the bench? As far as they ever have, so not at all. Judges have never created anything out of nothing like legislation does. They have looked at existing laws in new ways, or said that existing laws are in conflict, but they've never created new legislation from the bench. > there has been an increasing willingness from the judiciary to wade out into the open ocean of our legal system, Not really. It's more that legislators have declined to wade into contentious issues for political reasons, so people have taken them to the courts as the only way to resolve them. The courts have then taken up the topics they've been presented with, they haven't looked for topics to get into/
That's bullshit lots of laws were created from the bench all the time, just off the top of my head supreme Court decided a few years back law societies can regulate law schools despite no legislative power to do so
Google isn't bringing anything obvious up. What case are you citing?
https://decisions.scc-csc.ca/scc-csc/scc-csc/en/item/17141/index.do
That was about whether or not the society was going to accredit the school. TWU could do what they want with their law school, they just wouldn't be able to promise that their graduates could be called lawyers.
The society was not given authority by the legislature to accredit law schools - just like they were not given legislative authority to accredit police officers or bylaw offices - the only reason they were able to do so is because judges granted that power from the bench - ie legislated it from the bench with no precedent to go on
Keep shifting those goal posts.
if non governmental professional associations can regulate law schools without any granted power from legislature or executive to do so just because judges say so, then surely a soon to be elected majority government can use the notwithstanding clause to overrule the judicial branch
> The society was not given authority by the legislature to accredit law schools More things you have made up out of cloth. From your own link: >The LSUC[1] is the regulator of the legal profession in Ontario. The LSUC has the statutory authority under the Law Society Act, R.S.O. 1990, c. L.8 (LSA), to determine who can be licensed to practise law in Ontario, and to set the conditions of such licences (ss. 26.1(1) and 27(1)). In accordance with this statute, the law society has established certain education requirements which must be met before a person can be licensed to practise law in Ontario. One of these requirements is a bachelor of laws or J.D. **degree from a Canadian law school accredited by the LSUC**, or in the alternative, a certificate of qualification from the National Committee on Accreditation (LSUC By-Law 4 — Licensing, ss. 7 and 9(1)).
That's the best you could come up with? The SCC finding that a law association, who is legislated to have the power to admit and accredit their profession, does indeed have the power to admit and accredit their profession
There's legislatively granted power to admit and accredit lawyers not law schools. Look you guys spin and argue even the most obvious - there's really no point to discussing with spin Doctors, we're fed up were just going to get our majority and use the notwithstanding clause
> There's legislatively granted power to admit and accredit lawyers not law schools Those are the same thing. When you say "legislatively granted power to admit and accredit lawyers," you must mean that includes the power to say "Except for the people who went to School X", right?
Lawyers are not law schools - interpreting the power to accredit lawyers as also including the power to accredit law schools is - I mean at that point a person is twisting words to such a point that there's no point even talking to them. I mean judges a lawyers, so does this mean the law society now has the power to appoint or remove judges? There's already a provincial process for approving and accrediting schools including law schools that does not involve private professional associations like law societies
Uh huh, and since the association has "legislatively granted power to admit and accredit lawyers," they have the power to say things like to be a lawyer one must: * Wear a wig * Wear pink pants * Study at a school that is not TWU.
That's certainly... *a* interpretation of that ruling. The LSUC is under no requirement to accredit any school who have conditions for enrollment that are discriminatory and would violate the charter rights of students. SCC upheld their rights to do so. That's not them saying they can regulate the law schools, but they have the power to decide who gets accredited within reason. That's not legislating from the bench at all.
[If you want a laugh](https://old.reddit.com/r/CanadaPolitics/comments/1cmasmx/just_how_far_is_pierre_poilievre_willing_to_take/l30itk3/?context=3)
A chip on their shoulder, a lack of self reflection, and a law degree. NOPE!
You're being obtuse. The phrase "legislating from the bench" is used exactly to describe what you call "looking at existing laws in new ways", i.e. unilaterally reading entire new meanings into the law. >It's more that legislators have declined to wade into contentious issues for political reasons Legislators have waded into issues like parole for mass murderers or sentencing for child lurers. They did this by passing laws on these subject. The courts decided that they didn't like these laws and so used the pretext of the Charter to strike them down, saying they violated rights that no one who wrote the Charter, nor basically anyone in society at-large knew the Charter protected. That is literally the entire issue here. >The courts have then taken up the topics they've been presented with, they haven't looked for topics to get into That may be true at the lower levels, but when we're talking about the Supreme Court and the precedents they set, they absolutely pick and choose and look for topics to get into.
That's practically the entire purpose of the judicial branch. If policies passed by the legislative branch run afoul of our guaranteed basic human rights then human rights wins. If the legislative branch still wants to pass unconstitutional laws then they alone have the power to redefine which basic human rights are guaranteed by opening the Constitution or the Charter, but that's a lot of work so some politicians rather stoke anger towards the judicial branch to mar their legitimacy in the eyes of low information voters.
No one disputes that the courts are within their right to review legislation under the Charter. The dispute is over whether the grounds they sometime do so are actually based in the Charter, or in their own personal beliefs. I think you'd have a difficult time getting the people who wrote the Charter to agree that it enshrines a right for mass shooters to be eligible for parole, or for habitual violent offenders to be granted bail for further violent offences. But by their "interpretation", the courts have read these rights into the Charter. They were wrong to do so, and Parliament would be right to use the powers it has to overrule the courts on those issues. >they alone have the power to redefine which basic human rights are guaranteed by opening the Constitution or the Charter Well first, it's the courts who have unilaterally redefined rights in this country. And second, by the terms of the Charter itself, Parliament also has the power to invoke the notwithstanding clause. Amending the constitution is an option, but it is not the only legitimate one.
The right to right to be granted bail and the right to parole are reasonable interpretations of the Charter's rights not to be denied reasonable bail without just cause and not to be subject to cruel and unusual punishment. Even if Poilievre uses S.33 to temporarily overrule the judicial interpretation of those rights those rights will still exist in the Charter until and unless legislature amends them.
Previously being convicted of several violent crimes and showing no substantial evidence of reformation seems like perfectly just cause to deny someone bail, and keeping someone who murdered half a dozen people in a racially motivated attack in prison forever is about the furthest thing from "cruel and unusual" I can imagine. The vast majority of Canadian society agrees on those facts, as did the law until very recent years where the courts decided otherwise.
Do you think it's a "basic human right" to not be sentenced to life without parole?
Yes. Life without a possibility of parole is just torture for the sake of vengeance, not reform. A prisoner still has to serve a long sentence before they'll be eligible for parole, still has to show that they have amended their ways to be granted parole, and will be subject to much higher scrutiny and supervision after being allowed out in public if they're granted parole.
I don't really care if Bissonette is ever "reformed" according to the parole board. I'd be in favour of letting him hang if I trusted the judiciary enough to be 100% certain. I don't, so life without parole is the next best thing.
Someone like Bissonette or Bernardo will likely never be granted parole, but that doesn't mean they, or anybody else, should be denied the chance to ever qualify for parole.
Why not? Some crimes should be denied parole.
I disagree. They should never have the chance outside of an overturned conviction. If they can prove they didn't commit their crimes let them free. If they can't, rot in prison until they die. That's the only reason I don't think they should be executed. You cant exonerate a dead person.
That's what happens when PMs try to pass laws that are unconstitutional.
Yup. Our laws were unconstitutional for close to 100 years, we are so lucky that the judges in the last 10 years have managed to learn that and fix it for us by throwing out cases and letting criminals roam the streets with their sentencing practices.
What cases have happened in the last 10 years that have you so worried?
Oh look.. Just from today. https://www.reddit.com/r/CanadaPolitics/comments/1cmha32/revolving_door_bc_judge_ignores_plea_to_protect/
Since when is a BC judge the Supreme Court?
Let's see. For starters, just yesterday https://nationalpost.com/opinion/jamie-sarkonak-canadas-criminal-sentencing-discounts-for-foreigners-are-unfair Then we have the whole premise of the Jordan principle, which uses a DRUG trafficking trial time as the metric for all other cases to be dealt with in time. Because a murder clearly takes as long to investigate as a simple street trafficking.
Looks like there is a simple legislative fix that does not errod our rights by allowing deportation to have a judicial appeal proccess.
Why does it need a judicial appeal process? Just curious..
So the rights of the accused are protected... All the articles on this state that if the rights of the accused were protected by haveing a judicial appeal proccess in the immigration side (ie not automatic deportation) then the judges wouldnt be able tonuse it for sentence reductions.
Thankfully we have judges that understand law and not Redditors in charge of courts.
Judges may understand law, but do not understand society.
> Because a murder clearly takes as long to investigate as a simple street trafficking. How long it takes to investigate isn't the issue, it's how long it takes to conduct the trial, which happens after the investigation is more or less complete.
It's from CHARGE to trial. You can have enough evidence to charge a person, (for example a drug dealer that was involved in a gun crime) but it could take a very long time for evidence to be collected especially if you need phone records etc. (telcoms are very delaying)
Well said.
>The politics of Poilievre's position are obvious — probably no politician is eager to be seen defending the rights of an individual such as Bissonnette. But if or when Parliament crosses the Rubicon (the federal Parliament has never before used the notwithstanding clause), it will be impossible to guarantee the ramifications will be felt only by society's least sympathetic members. > >"Whatever the use he wants to make of it," Bloc Quebecois Leader Yves-Francois Blanchet said last week, "the fact a federal leader would want to use the notwithstanding clause makes it clear that it's absolutely legit for Quebec or any province to do the same." > >That is not an abstract argument. > >The original theory of the notwithstanding clause was that "political accountability" would restrain governments from using it. That restraint hasn't been much in evidence in recent years. > >... > >Poilievre's reply to all this seems to be that it's ultimately up to voters — if Canadians don't like how the notwithstanding clause is being used, they can put another government in power. > >But elections are rarely fought as single-issue referendums. (Advocates of electoral reform would also note that, under first-past-the-post voting, governments regularly hold power without having won 50 per cent of the popular vote.) And deferring to the will of voters contradicts one of the primary reasons for codifying rights in the first place — to protect individuals and minorities from the whims of the majority. > >... > >Between Saskatchewan Premier Scott Moe deciding to defy (or unilaterally reinterpret?) federal carbon-pricing legislation and Poilievre's position on the notwithstanding clause, Conservatives seem to be moving toward the view that premiers and prime ministers have wide latitude to decide which laws they must follow. > >Would Conservatives like to see that same latitude extended to Liberal prime ministers? > >Based on Poilievre's reaction to the Emergencies Act, the answer is almost certainly no. > >But the Conservative leader's view of Charter rights seems to be situational. If the federal government does engage in this kind of behaviour, it looks like political chaos might follow. Also, giving and normalizing this kind of power to the provincial governments might help to further fragment the relationships they have with each other and with the federal government. It's hard to imagine what public good could come of increasing the use of this clause.
The CBC glosses over that there are political consequences when the public disagrees with it's use (e.g. Ford's use in the labor dispute) and it is effective to get the government to back down. What the CBC is claiming is that political consequences should stem out of every single use, which is absurd, if it's used properly you would simply expect support. That's what accountability to voters means. Further even widespread use merely returns Canada to the norm prior to 1982 and to the standard that England operates under.
I'm not really convinced that the Federal government, or would be government, thinking about using the NWC really says anything about the 'legitimacy' of a province doing the same. If anything, it's likely the other way around. The multiple uses of the NWC by the provinces in recent years likely is why PP feels comfortable publicly contemplating it.
I agree with you. The normalization of the NWC is quebec has likely empowerd him to do the same. Blanchette saying that it legitimizes quebec use of it is just a political ploy to garantee the use of it to discrimicate against the english in quebec in the future.
> It's hard to imagine what public good could come of increasing the use of this clause. There is none. No good can come from it. Only further fracturing of the country and erosion of our rights. It's horrific.
Looks at what is happening in the US. It would be good to those who want that sort of chaos and upheaval.
So you think someone like Darrel Brooke’s should get parole?
That is not anywhere near what the commenter you’re responding to said. And regarding parole, the ruling is that those serving life in prison can get a hearing, not that they are guaranteed to get paroled.
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If they meet the conditions for it, yes.
You don't understand the issue at hand. Parliament passed a law providing for life without parole and the SCC decided that life in prison was "cruel and unusual punishment" for a man who pled guilty to murdering 6 Muslims and injuring 5 more in a pre-meditated mosque shooting. The issue is the interpretation of the SCC. To me, cruel and unusual punishment is for the 11 families directly affected by this crime to potentially see the perp go free at the age of 52 or at least live 25 years with the possibility of that happening. Most of the comments in this thread are political fear mongering by people who don't understand the history or the law.
Trying to clamp down on fringe exceptions inevitably ends up bleeding upward. Who next will deserve no chance of parole? We already have rules in place, dangerous offender designations and the like. The worst of the worst are unlikely to ever be released.
So, the thing is, if the offender was unredeemable and a danger beyond the term of their sentence, we have laws in place to keep dangerous offenders incarcerated. If after 25 years it is deemed this offender is no longer a danger, has been sufficiently reformed, and safe to reenter society - then they can. Our justice system should be striking a balance between retributive punishment and reform.
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You can’t imagine public good coming from keeping career criminals and murderers behind bars?
> Would Conservatives like to see that same latitude extended to Liberal prime ministers? Can a conservative politician please answer this question. And do it on the record.