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Published: 2005

Total Pages: 0

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The controversy became more pronounced at the time of the 15 December 1988 Supreme Court of Canada decisions in the Ford(2) and Devine(3) cases dealing with the signage provisions of Quebec's Bill 101 (Charter of the French Language) and the subsequent adoption by the Quebec National Assembly of Bill 178 (An Act to Amend the Charter of the French Language). [...] Section 33(1) of the Charter of Rights permits Parliament or a provincial legislature to adopt legislation to override section 2 of the Charter (containing such fundamental rights as freedom of expression, freedom of conscience, freedom of association and freedom of assembly) and sections 7-15 of the Charter (containing the right to life, liberty and security of the person, freedom from unreasonab [...] All rights and freedoms set out in the Charter are guaranteed, subject to reasonable limitations under the terms of section 1. This has the effect, in combination with section 32 of the Charter (making the Charter binding on Parliament and the legislatures) and section 52 of the Constitution Act, 1982 (making the Constitution, of which the Charter is a part, the supreme law of Canada), of entrench [...] There are a number of Canadian legislative precedents to section 33 in the notwithstanding provisions contained in the Canadian Bill of Rights,(6) the Saskatchewan Human Rights Code,(7) the Alberta Bill of Rights(8) and the Quebec Charter of Human Rights and Freedoms.(9). [...] Roy McMurtry, who participated in the First Ministers' Conference as Attorney General of Ontario, has written: The fact is that the clause does provide a form of balancing mechanism between the legislators and the courts in the unlikely event of a decision of the courts that is clearly contrary to the public interest.