Traditionally courts have seen themselves as the guardians of fair procedures. The substance of administrative decisions is for the decision-makers: they are the ones entrusted by the legislature with making decisions, and they have the expertise to do so. Courts have been much less deferential in addressing the processes by which those decisions are reached. […] Read more

There are important legal questions about the ability of the Canadian federal government to appoint members of the Federal Court and Federal Court of Appeal to the three Québec seats on the Supreme Court of Canada. I discuss some of these in this podcast with the McGill Law Journal. These questions will be answered by […] Read more

The recent UK Supreme Court decision in Osborn v. The Parole Board, [2013] UKSC 61 has already provoked interesting commentary on the relationship between the common law of procedural fairness and the European Convention on Human Rights. I have nothing to add to that commentary, but one of the things I find interesting about Osborn […] Read more

This is a second extract from my paper, co-written with Angela Cameron, on Furthering Substantive Equality through Administrative Law: Charter Values in Education. What follows is written for the context of education law, but applies much more broadly. What spaces exist for the furthering of substantive equality within the existing administrative law framework? Five can […] Read more

The UK government has established a variety of schemes with the goal of returning welfare recipients to the workforce. Some require claimants to work in return for benefits. R. (Reilly) v. Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, [2013] UKSC 68 addresses the legality of two of these “workfare” schemes. Of particular interest, given the […] Read more

I am finalizing the proofs of my article (with Angela Cameron) on Charter Values and Substantive Equality (downloadable here). Some extracts might be of particular interest to readers of this blog. Here is the first of them, the section entitled “Judicial Review and Administrative Decision-making”. We traverse two linked avenues of inquiry in this paper. […] Read more

One category of questions reserved to Canadian courts, rather than administrative decision-makers, is questions of general law of central importance to the legal system. The underlying idea is that there are some questions to which a uniform answer should be given, in the interests of the administration of justice.There is little guidance on what this […] Read more

There is another interesting Federal Court case which followed hot on the heels of the Slansky case I posted about here:  Douglas v. Canadian Judicial Council. The theme is similar: what sort of material can a decision-maker be compelled to produce? The underlying inquiry is into the Associate Chief Justice of the Manitoba Court of […] Read more

I have posted already on the controversy surrounding the nomination of Nadon J.A., a judge of the Federal Court of Appeal, to the Supreme Court of Canada. The question is whether he meets the criteria imposed by ss. 5 and 6 of the Supreme Court Act. Some have been dismissive of the case mounted by […] Read more

There are two important Canadian doctrines which affect the structure of administrative tribunals: impartiality and independence. Impartiality arises where a well-informed observer would have a reasonable apprehension of bias in a substantial number of cases. Independence, meanwhile, concerns the insulation of tribunal members from outside influence, something to be judged by reference to security of […] Read more