Constitutional law
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Absence of Evidence…
Last week, the Alberta Court of Appeal delivered an interesting decision rejecting a constitutional challenge to the province’s prohibition on private health insurance brought by way of an application. In Allen v Alberta, 2015 ABCA 277, the Court held unanimously that the applicant hadn’t provided a sufficient evidentiary basis for his challenge, and that it should have been… Continue reading
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Continuing the Conventions Conversation
Yesterday, I suggested that we may be in the midst of a change in the conventions pertaining to the formation of government after an election that results in what the British call a “hung Parliament” ― one in which no party has a majority of seats. Traditional convention allows the incumbent government to remain in office… Continue reading
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Constitutional Metamorphosis
The major party leaders have made some curious statements regarding the formation of a government in the aftermath of an election where no party claims the majority of seats. First Thomas Mulcair, then Stephen Harper, and then Justin Trudeau as well, have asserted that whichever party wins more seats than the others should be called on by the… Continue reading
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The “Unequal Bargaining Power” Trope
Defenders of trade unions generally, and of constitutional protections for union rights, notably the right to force an unwilling employer into collective bargaining and the right to strike, usually invoke the “unequal bargaining power” of workers and employers in support of their position. The Supreme Court relied on this claim when it constitutionalized the right to collective… Continue reading
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Safety Regulations and the Charter
I wrote earlier this week about the decision of the Court of Appeal for Ontario R. v. Michaud, 2015 ONCA 585, which upheld the constitutionality of regulations requiring trucks to be equipped with a speed limiter that prevents them going faster than 105 km/h. The Court found that the regulations could put some truck drivers in danger by… Continue reading
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Safety, First
Yesterday, the Ontario Court of Appeal issued an interesting decision in R. v. Michaud, 2015 ONCA 585, a test case challenging the constitutionality of regulations requiring trucks to be equipped with a speed limiter that prevents them going faster than 105 km/h. The Court found that the regulations infringed the truckers’ right to the security of… Continue reading
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The Fog of Law
The Prime Minister has announced that, should his government return to power after the election, it will seek to enact legislation criminalizing the travel to some parts of the world, considered to be hotbeds of terrorism. Both the list of areas in question and the details of the legislation are sketchy at this point, so… Continue reading
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Show ‘Em
Earlier this week, an American court issued a decision on a topic that is all but certain to come up for discussion in the weeks after October 19: the ballot selfie, and the attempts ban it. Judge Barbadoro of the U.S. District Court in New Hampshire declared unconstitutional that state’s law that made it an offence to… Continue reading
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Persuasion and Voting from Abroad
When Norman Spector and I debated the disenfranchisement of Canadians abroad on the CBC’s The 180 a couple of weeks ago, he pointed to the fact that some expatriates ― such as Americans he met in Israel while he was Canada’s ambassador there ― vote on the sole basis of the candidates’ policies towards their current… Continue reading
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False Friends
The elevation of Justice Brown to the Supreme Court has provoked an outpouring of anguish and anger about the system of judicial appointments in Canada. The critics of the current arrangements, whereby judges of superior, federal, and appellate courts are in effect appointed by the federal government, with relatively little ex-ante and no ex-post control by… Continue reading
Double Aspect 