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Page 6 January 11, 2016 • Law Times www.lawtimesnews.com COMMENT ©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. Information presented is compiled from sources believed to be accurate, however, the publisher assumes no responsibility for errors or omissions. Law Times disclaims any warranty as to the accuracy, com - pleteness or currency of the contents of this pub- lication and disclaims all liability in respect of the results of any action taken or not taken in reliance upon information in this publication. Publications Mail Agreement Number 40762529 • ISSN 0847-5083 Law Times is published 40 times a year by Thomson Reuters Canada Ltd. 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Still, Ontario remains the ultimate nanny state under the Liberals, who continue to hide behind the skirts of old prohibition crusaders. And yet to come? Marijuana, as the pre - mier has mused, could be securely sold through the Liquor Control Board of Ontario. Still, there are many questions. e point is that it isn't 1927 anymore and the moral underpinnings that guided the post- prohibition era's Liquor Control Act, R.S.O. 1990, c. L.18 demand new thinking. Remember, one of the original provi - sions of the LCA was the requirement that customers present a "passport" on which their purchases would be noted. Buy too much and a bureaucrat might suspend your rights. is system stood for 35 years. Will we see a return to it for pot? Don't laugh. is government is deter - mined to protect us from ourselves. For example, last May, the legislature passed Bill 45, e Making Healthier Choices Act, 2014. It brings in a slew of changes re - garding flavoured tobacco and so-called electronic cigarettes, and requires calorie counts on some fast foods. At the same time, amend - ments to the Smoke-Free On- tario Act, S.O. 1994, c. 10 bars smoking outside hospitals, psy- chiatric facilities, other govern- ment properties, and condo common areas, to name a few. Also as of Jan. 1, you can't sell flavoured to- bacco such as grape or cherry in Ontario. It's hardly a tragedy but a curious move. Ostensi- bly, it is aimed at minors who it is claimed like the flavoured tobacco, but there's no guaran- tee it will stop them smoking because they can just as easily switch to regular smokes, which aren't banned. Menthol will be banned in the next two years as well for the same reasons. e big hit, however, is against vapourizers, those electronic devices that heat up a liquid mix of nicotine, which incidentally comes in flavours such as cherry, grape, and cinnamon. Ontario has imposed regulations on their usage, though targeting those under 19 years of age for vaping is again questionable. Generally, vaping is initially more expen - sive than smoking cigarettes. An evape device costs about $100 plus the liquid nicotine mix. Kids under 19 generally don't have large disposable incomes, so buying individual smokes or cheaper, illegal First Nations smokes is something they are more likely to do than invest in an evape system. Secondly, vaping, though not scientifically proven as harmful or beneficial, does have some anecdotal evidence to support its role in harm reduction. Indeed, Lanard-Frontenac-Lennox and Addington MPP Randy Hillier spoke passion - ately last spring when Bill 45 was making pas- sage about how vaping was helping him and his staff cut back on smoking and get them on the road to cessation. We know nicotine is a powerfully addic - tive drug. Anything that could be helpful in getting smokers to stop or cut back surely deserves more investigation. But that's the problem with new technology. ere are also more challenges coming down the pipe, pun intended. Last year, to- bacco giant PMI — Phillip Morris Interna- tional, the maker of Marlborough and other brands — rolled out its iQos system in Italy, Japan, and Switzerland. Unlike evapes, it heats up processed organic tobacco and the com - pany claims the process removes the majority of known toxins found in cigarettes. It is po- sitioned as a nicotine delivery system, which reduces risk and harm to current smokers. e risk reduction claims are unproven, but like wine and beer, what we're talking about is a drug delivery system. Choose not just your poison, booze, pot, or nicotine but choose also how you ingest beer, wine, and leaves. Perhaps it's time the entire Liquor Con - trol Act was scrapped and a new act, the Controlled Intoxicants Act, was written to supplant it? To paraphrase Wynne's buddy, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, it's 201 6. LT uIan Harvey has been a journalist for more than 35 years writing about a diverse range of issues including legal and political affairs. His e-mail address is ianharvey@rogers.com. Give masters a raise It's been said that if you live long enough, you'll see every- thing. I've lived long enough to see one thing, and frankly I've had enough. e fight in this province over the role of masters has gone on since time immemorial. Heck, they were fighting about masters when I was an ar- ticling student in the 1990s and got my head handed to me at my first motion by, as I vaguely recall, Master "Blaster" D.H. Sandler. It was a rite of passage. For decades now, masters have been the poor cousins to their judicial brethren, sitting at the side of the table hoping to land some meaty scraps, only to be denied. Yet, like the wicked stepmother in Cinderella, the powers that be — which decide how the courts should operate in this province — foist more work upon masters for less pay than traditional judges. Rather than phase out masters, as was the plan in the 1990s under civil justice reform, they now do the work of traditional masters and have case management duties. Much of what masters do seems to fall into the purview of judicial authority, which requires the same type of independence protections and pay scale as judges. ey are more than tra- ditional civil servants. Lawyer Larry Banack's Report of the First Case Manage- ment Masters Remuneration Commission points out the pay inequities. Typically, case management masters are paid $94,000 a year less than a provincial court judge, and their annual pensions fall short by $100,000. Masters have a long history in Ontario's court system. e Banack report traces them back to pre-Confederation and the Court of Chancery, where the office was officially introduced in 1837. But the roots of the role date back to as early as 1794, with the clerk of the crown and pleas. A 1973 Ontario Law Reform Commis- sion report concluded that "Masters are essentially judicial officers…" and the gov- ernment responded by providing near-pay equity with provincial court judges. Since then, they have lost ground. If it walks like a judge, talks like a judge, and acts like a judge, then chances are it's a judge. Paying the 16 masters on an equal foot- ing with judges is certainly not chump change when you factor in pensions. How- ever, it would provide a lot more value than the billions of taxpayer dollars the Mc- Guinty-Wynne governments have frittered away on scandals such as e-health, shutting gas plants to win votes, the MaRS building bailout, and Ornge, to name just a few. e challenge is that a much-deserved raise for judges doesn't sell well when you're billions of dollars in debt and have doctors and civil servants seeking more. Wynne has been boasting about infra- structure investment. She should call the raises an investment in provincial infra- structure. ere might be no more impor- tant infrastructure in a civil society than its judicial system. To steal a line from Nike's CEO's play- book, Just Do It. It's time to right decades of wrong . LT Queen's Park Ian Harvey

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