BC Anti-SLAPP Legislation Upended by LGBTQ Radicals
Episode Stats
Words per Minute
106.44498
Summary
SLAPP is an acronym for Strategic Lawsuit Against Public Participation, and the legislative intent behind it is to stop people who are wealthy and in a position of power from exploiting the courts as a means by which to silence and punish critics.
Transcript
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What happened, so various defamation claims started in the fall of 2018 and about six
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months later, the BC government enacted this legislation.
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And SLAPP is an acronym for Strategic Lawsuit Against Public Participation, and the legislative
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intent behind it is to stop people who are wealthy and in a position of power, to stop
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them from exploiting courts as a means by which to silence and punish critics.
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You know, they can instigate litigation and drag people through the courts, and just the
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consequences of that process can be very punitive and can have an effect on freedom of speech.
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So the whole purpose of the SLAPP legislation is to prevent an abusive process in the courts.
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Here what you've got is the president of one of the largest public sector unions, 45,000
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some odd members, lined up with other large and powerful public sector unions, lined up
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with the government of BC itself, a whole slew of special interest groups and well-funded
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activists, all of whom are allied in an attempt to shut down any sort of debate about SOGI.
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And they do this essentially by libeling those who speak out about SOGI.
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So the whole SLAPP Act is being turned on its head here.
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It's designed to protect people like Neufeld from being crushed in the courts.
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And when he starts an action against Hansman, they turn that whole scheme on its head and
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What happened was after Mr. Hansman filed his SLAPP application, Barry's libel case was
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We then took it to appeal in the BC Court of Appeal, three judges at that level, set aside
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the earlier decision and reinstated Barry's claim.
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And then Mr. Hansman applied to the Supreme Court of Canada, which in a rather surprising
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And the issue, the issue here is simply whether Barry gets his day in court on a claim which
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There's no issue between the parties as to whether Barry's claim is valid.
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It's just a question of whether Mr. Hansman can avoid a trial by way of this SLAPP legislation.
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And the arguments that I tried to advance as best I could in Ottawa last week was that,
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like I say, the whole SLAPP thing has been turned on its head.