At issue in Association of Administrative Law Judges v. Colvin, was a directive issued by the chief administrative law judge of the Social Security Administration, setting out the following “goal” for administrative law judges: each one was to “manage their docket in such a way that they will be able to issue 500–700 legally sufficient […] Read more

Just a brief comment on the recent Supreme Court of the United States decision in Yates v. United States. While on a routine patrol, officials boarded a commercial fishing vessel captained by Yates to check that he and his crew were obeying federal fishing laws. Fully prepared for this important task, the officials took out […] Read more

Ishaq v. Minister of CItizenship and Immigration, 2015 FC 156 has received enormous media attention. The case touches on whether the government can require an applicant for Canadian citizenship to take off her niqab before she takes the oath of allegiance. Moreover, having lost at first instance, the federal government was very loud in announcing […] Read more

Can a court require the Prime Minister to appoint senators? Having been embarrassed (apparently through no fault of his own) by scandals involving his past picks, Mr. Harper is in no hurry to name any new senators to replace retirees. And the leader of the opposition, Mr. Mulcair, has vowed not to appoint any senators […] Read more

“A question of general law which will require the application of a correctness standard, aside from the constitutional questions and others mentioned in Dunsmuir, are becoming increasingly few and far between, if any still exist” — Loewen v. Manitoba Teachers’ Society, 2015 MBCA 13, at para. 54. And yet, and yet, and yet…in Wilson v. […] Read more

Canada’s Human Rights Tribunals have extensive powers to investigate and redress alleged breaches of fundamental rights by public and private parties. These statutory rights overlap but do not mirror the rights protected constitutionally; the human rights codes they are found in are usually described as “quasi-constitutional”. But Canadian courts have typically been cautious in allowing […] Read more

Trinity Western University v. Nova Scotia Barristers’ Society, 2015 NSSC 25 is the first in what is likely to be a long line of cases on TWU’s battle to get a law school up, running and accredited nationwide (see my earlier post here). Campbell J. found for TWU: the Society’s decision to refuse accreditation was […] Read more

I am happy to admit that, although I believe it is time for Canadian courts to follow the suit of several appellate judges and adopt a deferential approach to questions of procedural fairness, the question is not yet settled. Recently, though without mentioning the contrary jurisprudence in his own court, Nadon J.A. assumed a correctness […] Read more

I can’t resist passing on the postscript to Norman Siebrasse’s excellent post on standard of review issues raised in a recent (and interesting) patent case at the Federal Court: Finally, on a personal note, Dunsmuir was the clerk of the court in Fredericton, New Brunswick (the full name of the case is Dunsmuir v New […] Read more

Here is an interesting Supreme Court of the United States opinion on a statutory requirement to give reasons: T-Mobile South, LLC v. City of Roswell, 574 U.S. ___ (2015). T-Mobile wanted to build a cell-phone tower in Roswell. The City refused to give permission: the elected members of the Council adopted a motion to deny […] Read more