The Lori Douglas affair took a spectacular new turn yesterday, when the entire Inquiry Committee resigned. The Committee, established under the Judges Act, was inquiring into allegations against a Manitoba judge. The Committee published reasons for its decision. Notably, the Committee felt its function was being frustrated by the resort of various parties to the […] Read more

I have been quiet for the last couple of weeks, mainly because I have been working on two fairly extensive projects (along with the usual term-time workload) with short deadlines. One of these is a set of written submissions to the Senate Standing Committee on Legal and Constitutional Affairs, at which I am giving evidence […] Read more

The Supreme Court of Canada is hearing argument this week on a set of questions relating to the reform (or abolition) of the Senate. Part V of the Constitution Act, 1982 sets out various procedures for constitutional amendment. The Court has to determine which matters fall under which procedures. The Senate Reference involves classical questions […] Read more

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