I cannot recall any party ever getting elected nationally by bragging about the
number and quality of its lawyers.
Nevertheless, the record of our current government has been a perfect
illustration of what the lack of legal knowledge and procedural values can lead
to: the waste of time and money that went into legislation that was bound to be
struck down, as evidenced by the Supreme
Court’s reversal of the Onsite Clinic closure; the Court’s unanimous rejection
of several criminal justice reforms that obviously violated the Charter; and the
incredible mess that was the Fair Elections Act (since when does a government
respond to something like the Robo-Calls scandal by going after the referee? Since Stephen
Harper became prime minister, I guess).
The latest example is Bill C-51, The Anti-Terrorism Act, which
goes way beyond what is needed to update our existing security legislation. It
has faced mounting criticism from former Supreme Court justices, law professors
who have specialized in national security matters, and the Canadian Bar
Association. The 8 days allotted to this bill for parliamentary scrutiny is
totally inadequate for what is really an omnibus bill affecting every aspect
national security. (And will the Government please let the Privacy
Commissioner, Mr. Daniel Therrien, speak to the Parliamentary Committee on Bill
C-51? Is that really too much to ask?) And
of course the recent exchange in Question Period, in which the Leader of the Opposition
Thomas Mulcair simply asked whether the government had gone through the process
of sending a letter to the U.N. justifying incursions into Syria under Article
51 of the UN Charter, caught the prime minister flat-footed. It is further
evidence of government's lack of legal acumen.
The Liberals showed a lack of courage in not opposing this
bill on principle, but just weakly saying they would amend it later. Although the bill initially had 82% support in
the polls, that was obviously because people had only seen the title of the bill and not its contents. After
all, who isn’t against terrorism? It is revealing that the Liberals’ only
distinguished jurist, MP and McGill Law Professor Irwin Cotler, has abstained
from voting on this bill, just as he was missing in action last October when
the Liberals voted against the ISIL mission.
If the NDP got C-51 right, it was primarily because of the
lawyers in its caucus: Craig Scott (Osgoode Hall law professor), Murray Rankin
(Q.C. for his courtroom work in B.C. in constitutional litigation), Thomas Mulcair,
Linda Duncan, Eve Peclet, Romeo Saganash, Don Davies, and Justice critic Francoise Boivin. I know, you don’t like lawyers. But when it
comes to keeping government from enacting overly-broad laws that needlessly
impinge upon our civil liberties, they are indispensable. This federal
government has few accomplished lawyers, and it shows.
