"In a ruling today, Federal Court Judge Douglas Campbell said the government violated the Canadian Wheat Board Act by not holding a vote among farmers before introducing legislation eliminating the Wheat Board's monopoly position."
Politics - The Globe and Mail http://bit.ly/uROWSf
"Judge Campbell admonished the government for not consulting with farmers and "simply pushing ahead" with plans to essentially abolish the board. "Had a meaningful consultative process been engaged to find a solution which meets the concerns of the majority, the present legal action might not have been necessary," the judge ruled. He added that the government had to be "held accountable for [its] disregard for the rule of law.""
8 comments:
This decision will pretty clearly be sucessfully appealed.
The FCA and SCC have a greater appreciation of the constitutional principles than your run of the mill federal court judge. For anyone who has really studied constitutional law I don't think there is really a legitimate dispute about where the law is on this issue. Parliament is supreme except when it offends the constitution and cannot bind a future parliament. This is a bedrock principle of our system of government. Full stop.
This is one of those one off decisions you occasionally see coming out of lower courts that stands next to no chance on appeal.
With this ruling in mind I propose the following amendment to Bill C-19 be moved in the Senate:
The Minister shall not cause to be introduced in Parliament a bill that would change the firearms act in whole or in part unless:
(a) the Minister has consulted with firearm owners about the amendments; and
(b) gun owners have voted in favour of the amendments, the voting process having been determined by the Minister.
Rat makes an excellent point. I think anyone can envision a law they want the ability to repeal and would be livid at the idea that they are unable to. Whats next? Is the government going to put such provisions in ALL their bills? That would be madness!
Having read the decision in its entirety I see why it was arrived at. The government dropped the ball by not following the process for notice of constitutional question. So the judge never even considered the constitutionality of 47.1. He said that it wasnt properly before the court to decide. The unconstitutionality of 47.1 is fundamental to the governments case.
Well that explains a lot. Had they done that this would have came out very differently. Rest assured they wont make that mistake again.
From what I read I'm not sure that it would have mattered:
At paragraph 34 of the Producer Car Shippers argument, attention
is directed to the following passages from Professor Hogg’s text, Constitutional Law of Canada, (Carswell, Toronto, 5th ed, 2007):
Would the Parliament or a Legislature be bound by self-imposed rules as to the “manner and form” in which statutes were to be
enacted? The answer, in my view, is yes.
[…]
Thus, while the federal Parliament or a provincial Legislature cannot
bind itself as to the substance of future legislation, it can bind itself as to the manner and form of future legislation.
[…]
It seems implausible that a legislative body should be disabled from making changes to its present structure and procedures. Moreover,
the case-law, while not conclusive, tends to support the validity of self-imposed manner and form requirements.
It looks like the judge considered it, argued or not, and rejected it.
No he acknowledged that there is a manner and form exception but refused to consider whether this was a manner and form restriction. Go down a few paragraphs.
'....Campbell's decision won't necessarily affect the fate of the bill or the wheat board's future, because all it does is declare that the law was broken;
the court has no power to influence the process of legislation, and cannot test proposed laws against the Constitution or Charter of Rights and Freedoms unless and until they become law...'
http://www.sunnewsnetwork.ca/sunnews/politics/archives/2011/12/20111207-150832.html
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