Long-Gun Registry
Good Faith Across the Public-Private Divide
I spent most of today and yesterday in a colloquium on cooperative federalism, as part of the “G3” initiative that groups Université de Montréal, Université libre de Bruxelles and Université de Génève. I gave a talk on the gun registry case under reserve at the Supreme Court of Canada. One of the issues that interested […] Read more
Special Issue of Constitutional Forum on the Gun Registry Case
The Centre for Constitutional Studies’ Constitutional Forum has published a special issue on cooperative federalism and the gun registry case heard by the Supreme Court of Canada last week. My contribution (in French) is on the relevance of unwritten constitutional principles to the resolution of the case. There are also papers from my colleague Jean-Francois […] Read more
L’abolition du registre des armes d’épaule : le rôle potentiel des principes non écrits
I have a short paper on SSRN on the gun registry case that will be heard by the Supreme Court of Canada in the Fall. Here is the abstract: Section 29 of the Ending the Long-Gun Registry Act orders federal and provincial officials to destroy gun-registration records collected collaboratively over a period of two decades. […] Read more
Gun Registry and Data Destruction
My holidays have been delayed, much to my frustration! But on the plus side, I was at my desk for the Quebec Court of Appeal’s decision in the gun registry appeal: Canada (Procureur général) c. Québec (Procureur général), 2013 QCCA 1138. I criticized the decision in an oped for the Montreal Gazette yesterday. Here is […] Read more
Data Destruction and Public Law: Part II
You may be baffled by the gun registry decision, even having read my earlier explanatory post. You might think along the following lines: the federal government set this registry up in the first place, using its power to enact criminal laws, by making it an offence not to register certain weapons. If that is so, […] Read more
Data Destruction and Public Law: Part I
Major kudos must go to the Québec government’s team of lawyers, who masterminded the challenge which resulted yesterday in the grant of a permanent injunction against the destruction of the long-gun registry data by the federal authorities. The challenge was not taken seriously by most public lawyers when it was first mooted. Personally, I always […] Read more
Why Destroying the Long-Gun Registry Data is Unconstitutional
The literature on the establishment and operation of administrative agencies is voluminous. Even the destruction of agencies – deregulation – has inspired eloquent words. Less ink has been spilled about the consequences of deregulation. The impending argument over the abolition of the Long-Gun Registry is an example of destruction and deregulation giving rise to litigation. […] Read more