By: Linda McKay-Panos
PDF Version: Private Health Insurance and Charter Section 7
Case discussed: Allen v Alberta, 2014 ABQB 184
Over the past few years, various courts across Canada have addressed the ambit of the Charter right to life, liberty and security of the person in the context of access to private health insurance. Allen v Alberta, 2014 ABQB 184 (“Allen”) is Alberta’s recent case on this issue.
By: Martin Olszynski
PDF Version: The ‘Inherent Limit’ Post-Tsilhqot’in: Where Indigenous Law and Land-Use Planning Meet
Case commented on: Tsilhqot’in Nation v British Columbia, 2014 SCC 44
The focus of this post, the fourth in a series of ABlawg posts on the Supreme Court of Canada’s Tsilhqot’in decision (see here, here,and here), is the concept of the “inherent limit” pursuant to which Aboriginal title lands “cannot be used in a manner that is irreconcilable with the nature of the claimants’ attachment to those lands” (Delgamuukw v. British Columbia, [1997] 3 SCR 1010, at para 125). From conversations with my colleagues here at the law school, there appear to be at least three concerns about this aspect of Aboriginal title law: that it is paternalistic, that it has never been satisfactorily sourced or rooted in indigenous laws (a complaint going back to Delgamuukw), and that it creates uncertainty for development. In this post, I propose an approach to what the Chief Justice in Tsilhqot’in described as the “negative proposition” (at para 15) that addresses each of these concerns (perhaps especially the latter two), while also addressing a more general concern with respect to Canadian Aboriginal law, which is to say the absence of any role for indigenous laws.
By: Sharon Mascher
PDF Version: Today’s Word on the Street – “Consent”, Brought to You by the Supreme Court of Canada
Case commented on: Tsilhqot’in Nation v British Columbia, 2014 SCC 44
On June 26, 2014, the Supreme Court of Canada (SCC) granted the Tsilhqot’in Nation a declaration of Aboriginal title over 1,750 square kilometres of its territory. That the SCC has granted the first ever declaration of Aboriginal title in Canada, in and of itself, makes this a decision of great significance (see Jonnette Watson Hamilton’s post on that issue here). However, through its unanimous decision, the SCC has done much more than this – it has refocused the discussion around the infringement of Aboriginal title away from its current pre-occupation with consultation towards consent. In this respect the decision is momentous – not only for Aboriginal title holders but for all Canadians. For this reason, this decision may indeed mark, in the words of Tsilhqot’in Nation Tribal Chair Joe Alphonse, the beginning of a “new Canada” (see here).
By: Nigel Bankes and Jennifer Koshan
PDF Version: Tsilhqot’in: What Happened to the Second Half of Section 91(24) of the Constitution Act, 1867?
Case commented on: Tsilhqot’in Nation v British Columbia, 2014 SCC 44
The Delgamuukw decision of the Supreme Court of Canada, [1997] 3 SCR 1010 was an important decision both on aboriginal title and also on the division of powers under the Constitution Act, 1867– in particular for its robust reading of the “lands reserved” head of s.91(24) and the companion language of s.109 (provincial title subject to “any interest other than that of the province in the same”): see Bankes, “Delgamuukw, Division of Powers and Provincial Land and Resource Law: Some Implications for Provincial Resource Rights” (1998), 32 UBC L Rev 317-351 and Kent McNeil “Aboriginal Title and the Division of Powers: Rethinking Federal and Provincial Jurisdiction” (1998) 61 Sask L Rev 431-465. The Tsilhqot’in decision is also an important decision on both issues; but it will be remembered (if it too does not go the way of Marshall and Bernard, [2005] SCC 43 – read into nothingness as our colleague Jonnette Watson Hamilton points out here) on the division of powers issues as the decision that, in extended obiter dictum (see paras 98 and 126), eviscerated the lands reserved head of s.91(24).
By: Jennifer Koshan
PDF Version: “Arbitrary Disadvantage”: A Slip of the Pen or Something More?
Case commented on:McCormick v Fasken Martineau DuMoulin LLP, 2014 SCC 39
I have written several ABlawg posts on the test for discrimination under human rights legislation (see e.g. here, here and here). The ongoing issue in this series of cases is the extent to which the test for violations of equality rights under section 15 of the Charter should influence the approach in the human rights sphere. In the Supreme Court’s most recent human rights decision, McCormick v Fasken Martineau DuMoulin LLP, 2014 SCC 39 (CanLII), the Court continues to muddy the waters on the appropriate test. Linda McKay Panos has already written about the McCormick case and its implications for employment related complaints of discrimination here. As she noted in that post I have a few things to say about the case as well.
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