Action4Canada - March 16, 2022


Charter of RIghts vs Bill of Rights

Hosted by
Tanya Gaw
Mentioned
John Diefenbaker
They Broke The Law & I am Suing Them Leighton Grey, Senior Litigator is Fighting The Government & for Canadian Freedom

Episode Stats


Length

5 minutes

Words per minute

128.99

Word count

716

Sentence count

46


Summary

Summaries generated with gmurro/bart-large-finetuned-filtered-spotify-podcast-summ .

In this episode, I talk about the importance of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, and why it is the most important piece of legislation in Canada. I also talk about why the Bill of Rights was not written down anywhere in any document related to the law of Canada.

Transcript

Transcript generated with Whisper (turbo).
Hosts, guests, and mentioned names generated with spaCy (en_core_web_sm), reconciled against Wikidata.
00:00:00.000 We all know that Canada was formed in 1867, and from 1867 until 1960, individual rights
00:00:20.920 and freedoms were not written down anywhere in any document related to the law of Canada.
00:00:27.660 Our individual rights and freedoms were protected by unwritten British common law and other
00:00:36.360 customs that arose after 1867, okay?
00:00:41.100 And so that was the basis of our protection as individuals on our rights and freedoms.
00:00:47.740 It was unwritten law.
00:00:50.540 In 1960, Prime Minister John Diefenbaker and his government passed a Bill of Rights.
00:00:57.140 It became law in August 1960.
00:01:01.200 But I want you to remember, it was a law of the federal parliament.
00:01:08.120 It was not a law of all of the parliaments of Canada, because if it was, it would have been
00:01:15.500 the law of every province of Canada.
00:01:17.580 It was just a law of one parliament, and therefore, only had jurisdiction or power over people
00:01:27.140 who were under federal jurisdiction.
00:01:30.080 In other words, it didn't have complete jurisdiction or power to protect the rights and freedoms
00:01:37.600 of every individual in Canada.
00:01:40.000 It was just a federal law.
00:01:41.940 The difference between that and the Charter of Rights and Freedoms is the Charter of Rights
00:01:48.700 and Freedoms applies, is in the Constitution.
00:01:53.620 And the Constitution is the supreme law of Canada, not of the federal government and just its jurisdiction,
00:02:03.800 but all Canadians right across the country.
00:02:06.780 So there's a big difference between a provincial law and a federal law and the Constitution.
00:02:14.880 A provincial law applies to the provinces.
00:02:17.980 The federal law applies to the jurisdiction of the federal government.
00:02:22.780 The constitutional law, if you will, or the Constitution, applies to the whole nation by its very definition.
00:02:30.340 So, therefore, the Constitution and the Charter of Rights and Freedoms takes precedence over all the other laws
00:02:41.720 in the provinces and the federal government.
00:02:45.280 In Section 52 of the Constitution Act of 1982, it says,
00:02:50.540 the Constitution of Canada is the supreme law of Canada.
00:02:55.060 So there you have it.
00:02:56.360 It's clear, unmistakable.
00:02:58.700 The Charter of Rights and Freedoms is what we are fighting for today, because it applies to all Canadians.
00:03:08.260 And it is the supreme law of Canada.
00:03:10.620 And it was passed in 1982 in the House of Commons, in the British Parliament.
00:03:19.000 It was signed into law in April 1982 by Her Majesty the Queen right here in Canada.
00:03:25.900 Some people are saying that it never became law.
00:03:29.580 Oh, yes, it did.
00:03:30.580 It was passed by all the relevant parliaments, and it was signed off by the Queen.
00:03:35.880 And when she signed that, in that 1982 Constitution Act, which also contained the Charter of Rights and Freedoms,
00:03:45.040 there are statements which say,
00:03:47.440 no more laws of England apply to Canada.
00:03:52.320 All of Canada's laws in the future will be passed and completed in Canada.
00:03:57.960 We don't need to go back to London anymore for any reference.
00:04:03.520 We were totally and absolutely sovereign after the Constitution Act was passed.
00:04:09.320 It was passed by all relevant parliaments.
00:04:12.020 It was signed off by everybody that had to sign it, including the Queen.
00:04:16.000 And it made Canada completely and absolutely sovereign.
00:04:19.980 So everything after 1982 that Canada wanted to do, they could do under that Act,
00:04:27.560 without any reference to any other country, including London, okay, or the United Kingdom,
00:04:32.780 where a lot of us came from, and of course, where we were crowned colonies before we became a nation.
00:04:39.120 So I hope that's clear to everybody, because there's still some people who try to allege
00:04:46.060 that the Bill of Rights is more important than the Charter.
00:04:50.660 The Bill of Rights was very important in its day, don't get me wrong, and it's still a federal law.
00:04:55.280 But it's not applicable to all Canadians, because it is a federal law.
00:05:00.440 Remember, we are not a unitary state like the United Kingdom or like France.
00:05:05.500 We are a federal state where there are certain powers in the provinces,
00:05:09.300 and there are certain powers in the federal government.
00:05:12.820 That's why a federal act only applies to federal things.
00:05:16.880 Provincial act only applies to provincial things.
00:05:20.080 But the Constitution applies to both federal and provincial things.
00:05:25.620 It is the glue that keeps the country together.
00:05:29.060 It is the main document and the supreme law of Canada.