Law Times

Page 6 JUNe 29, 2015 • LaW TIMeS www.lawtimesnews.com COMMENT Court offers ray of environmental hope t was heartening to see a court in the Netherlands issue a brave ruling on climate change recently. In a landmark decision, the court ruled the Dutch government must address the dangers of climate change by reducing emissions by 25 per cent within five years. Noting the risks faced by those living in the Netherlands due to the threat of climate change, the court found the government should go beyond current plans to cut emissions by up to 16 per cent by 2020. Environmentalists, of course, hailed the decision. Further good news came with the Alberta government's move last week to double its ex- isting carbon levy to $30 per tonne by 2017. The change comes as the province's new NDP government vows to address climate change more proactively, an issue that has created headaches for the energy industry there. While the province has had the levy in place for many years, critics have long complained it was too low to be effective. The developments further reinforce the fact that in Canada, any progress on greenhouse gas emissions and addressing climate change will most likely come from areas other than the body that's in the best position to do something on a meaningful scale: the Canadian Parlia- ment. But they do offer some hope that incremental actions will lead to the more comprehensive solution most people recognize is necessary. Could a court challenge similar to the Dutch one succeed here based Taxpayers foot the bill as feds' legal losses pile up or a prime minister who has been spending plenty of money on constitutional litigation, Stephen Harper doesn't seem to have a lot to show for it. Not long ago, a Liberal MP, Scott Simms, asked six of Harper's cabinet min- isters to reveal how much of the taxpayers' money they had spent fighting 16 specific constitutional cases. Obviously, being a Liberal, Simms picked 16 cases he knew would show Harper and his cabinet had been wasting taxpayers' money, in this instance about $7 million of it. Simms didn't choose the cases at random. He chose those Harper had lost. Harper's legislation isn't all that bad, especially for a Conservative govern- ment. It's seems he just doesn't know how to write legislation that doesn't violate the Charter of Rights and Freedoms or the Constitution. NDP justice critic Françoise Boivin says the Conservative government needs to explain why there's a pattern of ram- ming through f lawed bills that don't stand up in court. So why does Harper keep throwing f lawed legislation at the courts? Maybe he thinks that sooner or later they'll come over to his side. It's more likely Harper doesn't know how to take legal advice from the scores of legal experts he has available to him or he refuses to listen to them as he thinks he knows the law better than they do. It seems he'd rather fight his case in court time and again and then attack the judges when he loses. One of the best-known losses was the Supreme Court's rejec- tion of Justice Marc Nadon's appointment to its own bench. Chief Justice Beverley McLach- lin had even called up the justice minister ahead of time to talk about it. Was it to warn Harper? Talk about doing Harper a favour. Harper, however, went ahead with the Nadon appointment anyway and lost the case. Since then, it has been one lost case after another. Harper acts as if the Supreme Court judges are against him, forgetting that he appointed most of them. In reality, they understandably feel they're there to up- hold the law rather than just agree with whatever Harper wants. Since 2006, Harper's government has brought in mandatory minimum sen- tences for 60 different crimes including gun and drug possession, sex offences, and drunk driving. Because of his manda- tory minimums, Harper has more people in jail than ever even though crime rates have dropped to a 50-year low. Harper shoots back that it's his ma ndatory minimums that have reduced the crime rate. Judges resent that and some of them have found ways around the mandatory minimums. Harper was on the losing side a few months ago when the Supreme Court ruled by a 6-3 margin that mandatory mini- mum sentences for gun posses- sion were cruel, unusual, and unconstitutional. In another instance, the judges struck down Harper's retroactive changes to pa- role eligibility because it imposed a new punishment on offenders already tried and sentenced by the court. Last July, a court ruled Harper's cuts to health care for refugee applicants from places Harper considers to be safe coun- tries amounted to cruel and unusual pun- ishment. That case cost taxpayers $1 mil- lion. The court gave Harper four months to change the refugee health rules. Instead of accepting the judgment, Harper is going to appeal. How many more millions will the government spend on that? Earlier this month, the Supreme Court said medical-marijuana users have a right to consume the drug in ways other than by smoking it. That was good news for peo- ple with lung problems as it could mean they could instead consume it in cookies, cakes, candies, and chewing gum. Health Minister Rona Ambrose ex- pressed outrage at the decision. She said the court was trying, like Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau, to encourage young peo- ple to use marijuana. Rather than judges, government medical experts should decide what kind of medical marijuana people can consume, she said. Talk about politiciz- ing a court decision. In another drug case, the Supreme Court decided the federal government had no right to close down a Vancouver clinic where drug addicts could inject illegal drugs under proper medical supervision. Lawyers have also found themselves in the middle of the controversies be- tween the government and the courts. In February, the court overturned a federal law that obliged lawyers to re- veal to the government certain financial transactions involving their clients. The Supreme Court found the law unconsti- tutional because it forced lawyers to be unwitting agents of the government. And so it goes with the Harper govern- ment passing laws and the courts over- turning them. Taxpayers, of course, con- tinue to foot the bill as the losses pile up.LT uRichard Cleroux is a freelance reporter and columnist on Parliament Hill. His e-mail address is richardcleroux34@ gmail.com. ©2015 Thomson Reuters Canada Ltd. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reprinted or stored in a retrieval system without written per- mission. The opinions expressed in articles are not necessarily those of the publisher. 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At the same time, there have been signals since the landmark Alberta election campaign that even the energy industry is warming up to the idea of more aggressive regulation. Canadians, of course, should have some say on the is- sue with the upcoming federal election campaign as well. Either way, it appears the prospects for change are growing even if Prime Minister Stephen Harper is likely to be one of the last people to acknowledge it. — Glenn Kauth F The Hill Richard Cleroux I

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