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Baroud d’honneur, your honour : une concession, mais trois critiques de l’affaire du juge Mainville
« Nous sommes tous d’avis que le pourvoi doit être rejeté, essentiellement pour les motifs exposés par la Cour d’appel du Québec. […] Les arguments fondés sur le Renvoi relatif à la Loi sur la Cour suprême […] ne résistent pas à l’analyse. Comme la Cour d’appel l’a indiqué […], le présent pourvoi concerne des dispositions Continue reading
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Commitment Issues
The Supreme Court has released its judgment in Canada (Attorney General) v. Federation of Law Societies of Canada, 2015 SCC 7, holding that some of the obligations which federal legislation intended to combat money-laundering and the financing of terrorism cannot be constitutionally applied to lawyers. It thus (largely) confirmed the decision of the British Columbia Court Continue reading
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A Standing Invitation
Today the Québec Court of Appeal dismissed the federal government’s appeal from the Superior Court’s decision in Barreau du Québec c. Canada (Procureur général), 2014 QCCS 1863, which granted the Québec Bar public interest standing to challenge the constitutionality of the mandatory minimum sentences ― all 94 of them ― introduced by the so-called Safe Streets Continue reading
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Up We Go
Just a quick post to note that Justice Pierre Dalphond of the Québec Court of Appeal has granted the federal government’s application for leave to appeal the Superior Court’s decision granting the Québec Bar standing to challenge, wholesale, the mandatory minimum sentencing provisions enacted by Parliament as part of an omnibus criminal law statute, the Safe Continue reading
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Open Bar
First of all, apologies for my silence. I’m afraid I will not blog much this week either, but I should resume normal schedule next week. I am able to write today, however, and want to discuss the decision of Québec’s Superior Court on a challenge to the standing of the Québec Bar to attack the Continue reading
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Dirty Laundry
Can the state enlist lawyers to help it crack down on money laundering in which their clients might be involved? This was the question addressed by the B.C. Court of Appeal in Federation of Law Societies of Canada v. Canada (Attorney General), 2013 BCCA 147, an important judgment delivered last week. Elevating the independence of the Continue reading
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A Bar Brawl
The Québec Bar has launched a constitutional challenge against a substantial part of the Conservative government’s “tough-on-crime” agenda, Radio-Canada reports. In an application filed in Québec’s Superior Court, it contends that every provision of the the omnibus criminal law bill, C-10, enacted by Parliament this year as the Safe Streets and Communities Act, S.C. 2012 c. 1, Continue reading
Double Aspect 