Stand on Guard with David Krayden - What YOU Need to Know： Justice Centre's Court Challenge Against Trudeau ｜ Stand on Guard (FULL Int)

00:00:00.880 Good morning. Welcome to another episode of Stand on Guard. I'm your host, David Creighton,

00:00:06.160 and we will be joining James Manson very shortly of the Justice Center for Constitutional

00:00:14.700 Freedoms. And we're looking forward to this because lots is happening. And I'm hearing

00:00:20.100 a lot of people say, you know, we need, we definitely need some movement in Parliament

00:00:26.340 right now because this could go on indefinitely. You know, I think that's, that's extremely

00:00:36.240 relevant. And I think what James and the Senator are trying to do is essentially challenge this

00:00:46.260 government to wake up. And it cannot dismiss Parliament. It has to be responsible to Parliament.

00:00:55.720 We'll be right back.

00:01:25.720 I'm going to show you a bit of a clip to show you what is actually not happening right

00:01:31.220 now with the Liberal leadership. Nobody wants to get on board. And I have found this absolutely

00:01:36.800 fascinating. Ah, James is here. Great. Thanks for your patience this morning, folks. And

00:01:42.920 welcome to the show, James.

00:01:45.840 Thanks very much, David. Good morning. Sorry about the technical difficulties just, just

00:01:49.900 know. But here we are. Here we are. Yeah. So just in case anybody has any, any doubt of

00:01:58.620 what's, what's going on here, that you are the lead attorney for the Justice Center for

00:02:04.100 Constitutional Freedoms challenge to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's prorogation of Parliament.

00:02:12.520 And you're acting on behalf of two individuals. I think this is quite interesting because this is

00:02:16.980 not, you did not do this unilaterally as an organization, but you're responding to David

00:02:23.340 McKinnon and Eris Lavranos, I believe from Nova Scotia or the Maritimes. And I guess my first

00:02:34.000 question is, can you walk us through why you think this is even feasible? I understand it's

00:02:38.420 based on a precedent in the UK with the UK Supreme Court saying Forrest Johnson should not have

00:02:47.420 prorogued Parliament in 2019 around the Brexit agreement.

00:02:52.780 Yes, David. Well, thanks. And let me just say hello to all of the viewers. You're quite

00:02:57.980 right. We are lawyers from JCCF for the Justice Center for Constitutional Freedoms.

00:03:05.080 Everybody can find us at jccf.ca. And a little bit of a quick plug, if anybody liked to support

00:03:12.320 the case, certainly check us out. Again, jccf.ca. Anybody wishing to donate to the case would be

00:03:18.340 much appreciated. David, turning to your question, we are acting for Eris and David out in Nova Scotia,

00:03:27.460 a couple of concerned citizens, you know, who basically agreed and approached us to, you know,

00:03:34.920 help them out. And in terms of the viability of the case, you're also quite right, David,

00:03:43.100 this does relate to the 2019 Boris Johnson prorogation in the United Kingdom.

00:03:50.220 And really, we're going to be doing the same thing as what happened back then in the UK.

00:03:59.220 In case we've sort of forgotten what happened with Boris Johnson, back during the Brexit negotiations,

00:04:07.960 back in 2019, we all may remember that there were eight weeks to go before a hard exit from

00:04:14.900 the Brexit situation with the EU. And so there hadn't yet been an agreement with the, you know,

00:04:22.180 between the UK and the EU. And people didn't know what was going to happen. And there could have been

00:04:29.000 economic and political chaos coming out of that, had there not been an agreement. But anyway,

00:04:34.400 in the midst of all of this, Prime Minister Johnson decided to prorogue Parliament for five weeks of

00:04:41.180 the remaining eight weeks before the final day of exit. And so ultimately, that got challenged in

00:04:50.540 the United Kingdom court system. And it made its way up to the Supreme Court very quickly within the

00:04:55.880 space of a month. Within the space of a month, it went from a prorogation all the way to a decision

00:05:02.380 from the Supreme Court. And that Supreme Court decision, David, excuse me, that decision from

00:05:08.120 the Supreme Court basically found that Boris Johnson's prorogation was unlawful. And why was

00:05:16.160 that? Well, basically, he never gave any reasons to the public for the prorogation. And so the UK

00:05:24.700 Supreme Court said that there's a very important principle that we all knew about, and we still know

00:05:30.880 about it's called parliamentary accountability. All right. That just means, David, that Parliament

00:05:36.360 needs to be able to do its job. Parliament needs to be able to oversee and supervise the government

00:05:43.720 of the day. And that means, of course, it has to be in session so that it can be in committees and

00:05:49.540 be on the floor of the House of Commons to do, you know, to, you know, for the question period,

00:05:54.040 things like that. And the UK Supreme Court found that because Prime Minister Johnson shut down

00:06:00.680 Parliament for five of those eight weeks, Parliament couldn't do its job. And particularly

00:06:06.880 at a very, very difficult, you know, period of time in the UK. So ultimately, they found that all of

00:06:13.960 that meant that the Parliament had been unlawfully prorogued. And ultimately, they found that Parliament

00:06:20.300 had never been prorogued. What the court said was, look, you know, the Prime Minister's advice to the

00:06:26.440 Queen was unlawful. And it basically was a nullity, meaning that it had never happened. And therefore,

00:06:33.260 Parliament had never been prorogued. And therefore, Parliament could go back to work the same or I guess

00:06:38.140 it was the following day. So in the UK, Parliament resumed sitting right away. So when you pull that

00:06:44.520 back then, David, to our case, you will see that, well, at least in our client's view, we will be

00:06:51.220 we're in the same kettle of fish, David, basically, we're going to be saying that Prime Minister Trudeau's

00:06:57.480 announcement last Monday, really gave a whole bunch of reasons that don't add up to reasonable

00:07:05.040 justification. That was the catch word from the UK's decision. There's got to be a reasonable

00:07:09.880 justification for the prorogation. And we're going to say that Prime Minister Trudeau's reasons don't

00:07:17.600 add up to a reasonable justification. Well, I think most Canadians would probably

00:07:23.120 concur with that assessment. I find it interesting that Justin Trudeau was on MSNBC over the weekend

00:07:30.800 with Jen Psaki. And he was asked about prorogation. And does he think this is going to in any way

00:07:38.580 impede his negotiations with President-elect Donald Trump? And of course, this tariff is

00:07:45.240 coming next Monday, a week from today. There's nothing Trudeau is going to do in the next week

00:07:49.640 to stop. And I think most Canadians realize that. But Trudeau responded, interestingly enough,

00:07:54.040 he said, I have all the tools at my disposal that I need, even though Parliament's not sitting.

00:08:00.140 The same time, Foreign Affairs Minister Melanie Jolie is on CTV's question period yesterday,

00:08:06.160 and she's saying all political parties need to pull together right now in a show of unity.

00:08:13.820 This is the same government that just dismissed all of these political parties from the House of

00:08:17.960 Commons. And it's essentially silenced them in a very legislative way, at least. Yes, they're free

00:08:24.940 to go to the media. But legislatively, they have been cut out of the process. And I think this is

00:08:31.200 outrage Canadians, because this is clearly a political partisan move on behalf of Justin Trudeau.

00:08:39.940 Anybody can see that. He talked about this being a great reset, which reminded me of things he said

00:08:47.580 before about great resets. But I don't think... Do you think the Governor General, Mary Simon,

00:08:56.060 had a choice? When Trudeau came to her and said, I want to prorogue Parliament, apparently it took her

00:09:03.220 about 10 seconds to make her mind about that. And she literally came back and said, go ahead. 0.97

00:09:10.180 Not even thinking. She didn't even take an hour to think about it. But do you think... Did she have a... 0.96

00:09:15.700 Did she have the constitutional authority to say, no, there's no reason for this? And as Governor

00:09:21.700 General, I'm saying, no, that's my role. That's my constitutional authority. So David, I think you

00:09:28.000 raised a couple of interesting and excellent points. And there's a couple of things that I want to say

00:09:32.580 just off the bat in response. Number one, I want to make it clear to the viewers that this court

00:09:38.120 challenge that we're doing is not based in political considerations. We're talking about a legal

00:09:44.860 and a constitutional challenge. Our clients are more concerned not with the government of the day

00:09:52.920 and who happens to be in charge and whether Prime Minister Trudeau is a bad politician or a good

00:09:58.300 leader or what. This has nothing to do with that. This is more about the entire working of the

00:10:03.800 constitutional order in our government, in our system. It doesn't matter whether it's a conservative

00:10:10.220 Prime Minister or a Liberal Prime Minister or any other Prime Minister. The question that this lawsuit

00:10:17.020 seeks to answer is, what are those limits? What are the limits of a Prime Minister's power to dissolve,

00:10:26.460 or not dissolve, prorogue Parliament, pardon me? What are those limits? Because there must be some limits.

00:10:32.540 Naturally, I think everybody would agree that a Prime Minister can't just prorogue Parliament forever.

00:10:37.820 So that means there must be some limits. Well, what are those limits? That is an important question

00:10:43.260 that's never been answered before here in Canada. And I think it's very important for all Canadians,

00:10:49.260 and also politicians, future Prime Ministers, to understand exactly how far they can go to use this

00:10:56.060 extraordinary tool called prorogation. So David, then turning to your next question with respect to the

00:11:02.380 Governor General. My view is that we don't want to be testing or criticizing the Governor General

00:11:15.660 for agreeing to the advice given by the Prime Minister. Over time, David, what's happened,

00:11:22.140 of course, in our society, or rather in our government, is that the Prime Minister has become the, you know,

00:11:27.260 the person who wields all the power. We don't really have a Governor General who's got any real

00:11:33.580 particular power in this case. And I don't think we want that. I don't think we want to have a Governor

00:11:38.540 General that can stop for a minute, think about things and then say, you know what, no, I'm not

00:11:44.620 going to do it. That would be extraordinary. For Governor General Mary Simon, in this case,

00:11:52.220 to stand up to Prime Minister Trudeau, shall we say, and say, no, Prime Minister, I'm not going to

00:11:57.580 grant you prorogation because, for whatever reason, now we have a different power base in our

00:12:03.820 government. We have a Governor General who is saying no to the democratically elected people,

00:12:08.620 right? We must remember, David, that nobody elected Governor General Simon, nobody elected the King.

00:12:14.300 Of course, she's the King's representative here in Canada. And I don't think we want to be,

00:12:19.100 you know, moving back to the olden times when the King had unlimited authority to stop the

00:12:24.300 democratic processes of the government. Naturally, I appreciate that some people are very unhappy with

00:12:31.740 the way this all went down. And, you know, perhaps they're quite unhappy with the way the government

00:12:37.100 has gone on for the last few years or even the entire time. I appreciate that. But I don't think that

00:12:43.100 that has caused to call upon another person, for example, the Governor General, to sort of overrule

00:12:50.220 the Prime Minister's decision. Whether we can get there depends on, at least in my view,

00:12:57.580 on the success of this case and whether the Prime Minister's limits, whether those limits of power,

00:13:02.940 first of all, what are they? And secondly, once we answer that question, we will then ask,

00:13:07.740 did the Prime Minister's decision on Monday exceed whatever that test turns out to be? I think

00:13:14.060 that's the more democratic and better way of going about this.

00:13:17.420 You know, so you're saying the impetus should be on the courts, not the Governor General,

00:13:22.380 if this is an abuse of prorogation, that the courts need to intervene, not the Governor General?

00:13:29.340 I think that's the better view, David, because think about it this way. All of the viewers who

00:13:34.780 are maybe, you know, secretly hoping that the Governor General might step in and might do something,

00:13:40.540 maybe if they have the government that they want next time, they wouldn't want the Governor General

00:13:46.060 to be doing the same thing to their Prime Minister. So we can't really have it that way. I don't think

00:13:50.860 that would be very good. Yeah, because when I first commented on this a couple of days before it

00:13:56.780 actually happened, I didn't expect this to happen so quickly. I thought she would take a couple of 0.88

00:14:00.540 days. I think I encouraged people to correspond and say, please think about this decision. You know,

00:14:07.660 the Honourable Governor shall be respectful, but ask her please to think about it, at least.

00:14:13.340 Because my mind went back to 1926. And anybody who knows Canadian history would know that Mackenzie

00:14:22.300 King, Prime Minister Mackenzie King went to Governor General Bing at that time and said,

00:14:27.740 I want to dissolve Parliament. I can no longer sustain my minority government, my coalition. He was

00:14:34.380 working with the progressives at the time. Lord Bing of Vimy, and this was a highly respected

00:14:40.380 individual, a war hero from the Great War. He said to Mackenzie King, I can't dissolve Parliament,

00:14:47.020 because there's another option. The conservative opposition should be asked to form a government.

00:14:54.220 And constitutional scholars all agree that Lord Bing was correct in his assessment, that he had the

00:15:03.020 constitutional authority to do that. However, I think as you would probably point out, the public

00:15:09.180 relations follow, even in 1926, was horribly against the Governor General, because it looked like he was

00:15:16.140 usurping the power of the democratically elected Prime Minister. So I think I take your point here.

00:15:23.180 This might, you know, might not be the best way. So I guess that gets me to the next question.

00:15:28.460 Do you think you can win this in a reasonable amount of time?

00:15:34.380 Short answer, yes.

00:15:35.420 I think that our constitution here in Canada is very similar to that of the United Kingdom. In fact,

00:15:47.580 our constitution, David, as you may know, contains a preamble and the preamble of the constitution here

00:15:53.580 basically explicitly says that our constitution is supposed to be based in principle similar in, you

00:15:59.900 know, in principle to that of the UK. And that's, of course, because of our shared legal history,

00:16:05.660 you know, and constitutional history over the years. So what happened in the UK, that case back in 2019

00:16:13.580 with Boris Johnson, we don't see any principle difference between what happened then and what

00:16:19.660 happened here in terms of the actual, you know, constitutional rules that ought to be, you know,

00:16:25.740 set down. In the UK case, once again, it wasn't an earth shattering case, to be honest, what the

00:16:32.620 Supreme Court said was simply, the Prime Minister's got to have a pretty good reason to shut down

00:16:38.140 Parliament for a period of time. This is the democratically elected body. And of course, David,

00:16:42.780 we have to remember that Parliament is the supreme body in Canada in the federal system,

00:16:49.900 not the government, right? Parliament's duty, again, is to oversee and check and supervise

00:16:55.660 the government. And so anyway, the Supreme Court said that, you know, that is an important function.

00:17:00.300 And so in order for the executive to shut down the legislative branch for a period of time,

00:17:06.940 there's got to be a reasonable justification. I don't think that that's too much to ask for the

00:17:12.460 Prime Minister to have some kind of a good reason. And so then we have to turn to the actual reasons

00:17:19.100 that the Prime Minister put forward last week. Well, there's a couple of them, aren't there?

00:17:25.180 There's the leadership race, you know, argument. And there's the argument where he said that he

00:17:31.660 wants to reset Parliament. And let's take the first one first. In terms of a leadership race,

00:17:40.940 our client's view, David, is that that is not a reasonable justification in and of itself. Because

00:17:47.340 really, when you're talking about having a leadership race for the leader of the party,

00:17:52.140 that's a party matter, right? That's not a government matter. We have to remember, of course,

00:17:57.500 David, that political parties are really nothing more than a collection of people that have the same

00:18:04.780 views, right? Once you get elected into government, now, the people who form the cabinet,

00:18:11.020 they are ministers of the Crown, they are not ministers of the Liberal Party. So ultimately,

00:18:16.460 when you're having a leadership race for your party, that's an internal matter. That's what our

00:18:23.740 clients will argue anyway. And we will say that that's got nothing to do with the business of the

00:18:30.140 actual government. I mean, the Liberal Party on Monday afternoon last week could have pointed it

00:18:35.900 pointed to any of their members and said, this is the new interim leader. And this is going to be the

00:18:41.260 new Prime Minister and that's it. And then that Prime Minister could have gone back to Parliament

00:18:45.740 the next day and faced the opposition. But that's not what happened, of course. So our view is that the

00:18:52.300 first reason doesn't pass muster. The second reason, David, is to reset Parliament.

00:19:00.780 Now, here's the tricky part a little bit. Oftentimes, resetting Parliament is a valid reason

00:19:07.900 for having a prorogation. Because what happens is, a government may reach the end of its legislative

00:19:15.580 agenda, they may have a few ideas for what bills to pass and what to do. And then they reach the

00:19:20.700 end of that agenda, all the bills they wanted to pass got passed, everything they wanted to, you know,

00:19:26.300 put forward got put forward. And they're at the end. So now they need to go back to the Cabinet

00:19:31.260 departments. And all the, you know, Cabinet ministers have to go back to their people

00:19:36.300 and come up with new ideas, new legislative proposals, new policy issue areas that they

00:19:41.740 want to start legislating on. And then they have to write a new speech from the throne. And they have

00:19:46.860 to, you know, breathe some more life into the government and then carry on. And that's okay.

00:19:52.540 Normally, that's a that's a legislative reset. And that's usually happens, you know, during each

00:19:58.460 Parliament, not really a big deal. But here's the thing, David. Number one, it doesn't last 11 weeks.

00:20:04.620 Number two, we're not talking here about a legislative reset. Prime Minister Trudeau on on Monday was

00:20:13.260 talking about just a reset because of the tone, or because it was paralyzed or because, you know,

00:20:20.380 everything was toxic in Parliament, and that everybody had to rate had to lower the temperature,

00:20:25.340 I think, to use the Prime Minister's words. Well, in my view, I think in my client's view, again,

00:20:31.340 I'm not sure that that is a reasonable justification, because there are other more

00:20:36.940 democratic and more, you know, probably impactful ways to lower the temperature, it would be called

00:20:44.060 having an election. Why couldn't why couldn't the Prime Minister simply dissolve Parliament

00:20:49.020 and call for an election that would that would probably take care of the paralysis in Parliament.

00:20:54.380 Obviously, you know, my clients read the polls as well as everybody else. And we understand that

00:21:01.180 if there were an election today, likely the Conservatives would win. But it doesn't matter

00:21:06.380 that it's the Conservatives that might win. We're just saying that there could be an easy fix to this

00:21:11.980 without shutting down Parliament for 11 weeks. The other thing, of course, is why 11 weeks, if all if

00:21:18.620 everyone just has to take a breather and lower the temperature, why is 11 weeks the necessary timeframe?

00:21:25.660 Why couldn't it be two weeks or three weeks? We must remember again, David, every day that goes by,

00:21:32.620 Parliament cannot do its job. And of course, we still haven't mentioned the incoming economic threat

00:21:38.620 from President-elect Donald Trump. That is a big deal. That is a serious deal. Now, we don't know,

00:21:44.620 of course, whether President-elect Trump will actually impose a tariff, but all signs point to yes.

00:21:51.020 So this is the backdrop, of course, against which Parliament, again, can't do anything. They can't,

00:21:57.500 they can't do anything right now to support the government to pass any new legislation to ratify

00:22:02.860 an agreement that might be become necessary to ratify all these types of things, including simply

00:22:09.900 standing up and asking questions on behalf of Canadians to the ministers who are apparently

00:22:15.660 now running around in the in the States and everywhere else, talking about things like,

00:22:22.300 you know, energy, you know, banning energy to go to the States. I think they were talking about that

00:22:27.980 yesterday. All kinds of things that are on the table, apparently said the foreign, I think it was the

00:22:32.380 Foreign Affairs Minister. Well, these are all naturally of great concern to Canadians. And at the moment,

00:22:37.740 as I say, Parliament can't do anything to help with the situation. And so that is obviously a real

00:22:44.540 problem. So long, long answer to your question, do you think we can win? Yes, I do think we can win,

00:22:50.620 because I think in our view, the reasons given by the Prime Minister don't add up to a reasonable

00:22:57.900 justification. And that violates the test laid out by the Supreme Court of the UK. And one more thing,

00:23:03.900 David, before I turn it back to you, sorry. We have to understand as well that the UK's decision

00:23:11.020 isn't binding on our courts, right? I want the viewers to be clear about that. The UK's decision

00:23:16.780 is only a helpful analytical tool that we can use here. We're going to be inviting the court here in

00:23:23.580 Canada to accept that reasoning. It's not binding, of course, but we'll we'll be making that pitch to the

00:23:29.500 court. Well, you mentioned the fact that it was Melanie Jolie saying everything's on the table,

00:23:35.740 including energy. I think Daniel Smith, Premier Daniel Smith of Alberta, would argue that that's

00:23:40.860 ultra varies, is that the government, federal government has no right to say that energy is

00:23:46.380 on the table. That's provincial jurisdiction. But this is why I, you know, I totally agree with what

00:23:52.300 you're doing here, because this situation is fraught with so many difficulties. And there's just no

00:23:59.580 response except through the media right now. And there's no legislative ability. And any kid who has

00:24:06.940 taken high school history of Canada knows that our democracy is based on responsible government,

00:24:14.700 that the executive branch is responsible to the legislative branch, which, of course,

00:24:19.980 isn't happening right now. There is no legislative branch meeting. That's right. You know, a lot of

00:24:25.420 people think that the government's not operating because parliament, of course it is, but it's

00:24:29.260 operating by decree, which, of course, is how dictatorships function. That's right. That's right. David,

00:24:36.140 David, I wanted to just interject. Yes, I'm sorry to do that. But but your comment made me think about

00:24:43.980 a conversation I had yesterday with another citizen. And I was telling her about the case. And

00:24:49.660 she felt a little bit uncomfortable with what we were trying to do because of this grave economic

00:24:56.700 threat coming from the states right now. She said, I don't know that this is the right time to plunge

00:25:02.780 Canadians into an election. I mean, if you're right, James, she said, then there's going to be people

00:25:09.100 are going to go back to parliament. There's probably going to be a non-confidence motion right away.

00:25:13.820 And then there's going to be an election. And that's not the right time to have an election

00:25:17.820 in the middle of all this economic turmoil. I mean, don't we need people to be dealing with this

00:25:21.980 rather than, you know, having all these shenanigans with respect to an election?

00:25:27.260 And while I take that point a little bit, David, your comment just now about, you know, tyranny

00:25:34.380 and authoritarian government and ruling by decree, that was in my mind when when that person made

00:25:41.660 those comments to me, because my answer was, I understand it's tough, but our constitution must prevail.

00:25:50.620 The constitutional order that we've got must prevail. Parliament must be able to do its job,

00:25:56.780 and they might make a hash of it. It's true. It's possible that that, you know, we end up muddling

00:26:01.660 through. But the the actual order, the actual way things things are supposed to work, it has to work,

00:26:08.780 because if it doesn't work, if the prime minister can simply shut down parliament whenever he or she wants,

00:26:15.180 for whatever reason, then we are in a situation where the executive has prior has absolute priority

00:26:23.180 to do whatever it wants. That cannot be acceptable in our country. So even though things may be difficult

00:26:31.100 with the whole economic threat, the the what's going on in this case, and these issues raised,

00:26:38.620 in my view, I think in my client's view, are are even more important. I'm sorry to have interjected there,

00:26:44.780 David, but that was what I was thinking when you made your comment.

00:26:47.580 Not at all. That's what you're here for, because you're the expert. I'm merely commenting as a

00:26:53.340 journalist who has certainly had some interest in this area for quite some time. But I find this

00:27:00.220 extremely, extremely problematic. And a lot of people are asking me if they do manage to have a

00:27:08.300 leadership convention, and they do manage to elect a new leader, and I'm not entirely convinced this game

00:27:13.900 plan is going to work if they have to find people who actually want to run first. We have two non-entities

00:27:20.380 right now who have said they're running. Yes. And they have to come up with $350,000 apparently,

00:27:26.620 which is quite a lot of money to get into the race. Quite a lot of money. I mean,

00:27:30.460 Mark Carney has that kind of money. I'm not even sure Christian Freeland can find that kind of money

00:27:34.380 in such short notice. But this certainly looks, if it's not, if it's not a ploy for Justin Trudeau,

00:27:40.300 this hang on to power, it's a coronation for Mark Carney. But having said that, is it possible

00:27:47.340 for this government to come back on March 24th with a new leader and prorogue again? Because they don't

00:27:55.260 want that non-confidence vote. They want people to get to know the new Liberal leader. And is it

00:28:00.780 possible for another prorogation to occur? Interesting question, David. I guess it would

00:28:08.780 be technically possible. I can't imagine how that would help them, first of all, in the eyes of the

00:28:16.700 public. I can't imagine that the media would be particularly kind to them. Your next question,

00:28:23.180 of course, would be, you know, can the Governor General do anything at that point? And would my

00:28:28.940 opinion be any different than what I just told you 10 minutes ago? Fair point. I don't know that

00:28:36.380 any government would ever have the courage, shall we say, to try to prorogue a second time just coming

00:28:44.460 back from a first prorogation. That to me would be political suicide. Maybe at that point, the Governor

00:28:54.140 General might have another thing to say about it. I don't know. And frankly, I don't know how

00:28:58.860 I might feel personally about it. I don't think I would want. I just said to you 10 minutes ago,

00:29:03.260 David, that we don't want the Governor General to be in the business of refusing things from the

00:29:08.540 Prime Minister. To prorogue a second time. Wow, that would be that would be quite something. I'm not

00:29:16.380 sure what I what I think about that. But but I guess it's technically possible for that to happen.

00:29:23.740 I think, though, however, the practicalities of the situation probably will be will take care of

00:29:31.420 it. And that's because of the money. What the viewers may appreciate, David, is that the government

00:29:38.700 only has a certain amount of money every few months. And those come by way of supply bills, as you

00:29:43.980 know. And so that's all sort of in line with the budget. And every few months or so, I think that,

00:29:49.420 you know, they have to get together and formally pass a new legislation which actually disperses money

00:29:55.500 to the various departments of the government. So without that, the government runs out of money.

00:30:01.660 And so my understanding is that there is there has to be a supply bill done by the end of March,

00:30:07.900 which, of course, coincidentally dovetails with the recall of Parliament on March 24th, I think it is.

00:30:14.140 So everybody realizes that the government runs out of money at the end of March. Therefore,

00:30:19.340 there must be a money bill laid before Parliament that will have to be, by the way, David, as you know,

00:30:29.100 I'm sure that is a confidence bill for the I think I think the viewers probably understand as well.

00:30:37.260 Every time there's a money bill involved, that is automatically a confidence piece of legislation.

00:30:43.900 So the vote on that particular legislation is treated as a confidence motion, essentially. So

00:30:50.540 if that bill fails, then the government is is basically obligated to resign. I don't know that

00:30:58.300 that's technically true. But that is the long standing convention in Canadian politics and UK politics,

00:31:04.940 which is that if a money bill fails, the government's kind of obligated to resign. And

00:31:09.260 that's probably what would happen in this case. And so if we're talking about proroguing a second time,

00:31:17.180 I don't know how that could happen. Because if it were to be prorogued a second time,

00:31:23.820 then the money bill couldn't be done and the money bill has to be done.

00:31:27.100 So if the money bill can't be done, then the whole thing runs out of money. And then we're into absolute

00:31:32.300 chaos. I don't even think that well, I don't think any any government would would would do

00:31:39.100 would do that. You know what I mean? I think that is probably not going to happen. What has to happen

00:31:44.780 is the is the supply bill needs to be, you know, tabled in the House, and then it'll be voted on. And then

00:31:50.780 it'll it'll probably fall. I mean, this is what we understand. But all the opposition parties have said

00:31:56.780 that they're going to vote down the government, this will be the first opportunity, of course,

00:32:00.780 unless our lawsuit is successful, and they're back in Parliament earlier. But at the limit, I think,

00:32:08.060 you know, sometime at the end of March, there will be that there will be a voice from Parliament

00:32:12.700 saying that, you know, that we have to have an election.

00:32:14.780 Well, I think that assessment will reassure a lot of Canadians who are seriously concerned that this

00:32:21.180 government will continue to do whatever it takes to stay in power, including a second prerogation.

00:32:27.980 But I think if you if you're saying that financially this is not going to happen, well,

00:32:33.180 that might be the only thing that would stop them. Final question, I think, unless unless I had

00:32:39.660 something else for you, it was the your colleague John Carpe, a friend of friend of mine, and I've

00:32:45.500 worked very closely with him on Bill C 63, the Online Harms Act in a Western Standard opinion piece

00:32:52.860 that Bill C 63 died with prerogation. There's been a tremendous confusion about whether or not

00:33:00.540 government bills have died, whether private members bills die, whether both die with prerogation.

00:33:07.580 The parliamentary website is contradictory. In one point, it says, yes, government bills die. Another

00:33:14.460 point, they don't die. The National Post recently did a piece saying that now the precedent is that

00:33:21.980 government bills won't die. They'll come right back where they were. So we're we'll be at second reading

00:33:27.740 with Bill C 63. If this if the House resumes, what's your assessment of that is? Can we at least

00:33:34.940 take that from this prerogation that bills like C 63 have died?

00:33:41.580 My understanding is that, yes, they have died currently. If the prerogation is valid, and if

00:33:49.580 our lawsuit does not succeed, then my my sense is that, yes, all the all the bills die on the order

00:33:58.300 paper, as as they say, I understand that Parliament can reconvene after the next election or whenever

00:34:05.100 they come back for a new session. So let me just sort of stop and just just just unpack that a bit.

00:34:13.420 The if if prerogation is valid, and we don't win, and ultimately Parliament comes back on the 24th.

00:34:23.100 Now it's the second session of Parliament, not the first. So they just they just ended the first

00:34:29.100 session of Parliament. I think it's the 44th Parliament. Now it's going to be the second session

00:34:34.300 of the 44th Parliament. Again, unless we're right. So if if if our lawsuit prevails and my clients prevail,

00:34:42.780 we will be asking the federal court to declare the prerogation basically a nullity. And that's going

00:34:50.860 to mean that Parliament, just like in the UK, never was prerogued at all. So my sense of it would be that

00:34:58.780 we would still be in the first session of the 44th Parliament. And that would mean if if if our lawsuit

00:35:05.500 prevails, that that in fact Parliament had never been prerogued at all. So all of the bills and all of the

00:35:12.540 committees and all of all of all that would still be operating, it would still be there. So there

00:35:19.260 would be nothing dead, everything would still be live until Parliament is dissolved. And there's another

00:35:25.820 election, or Parliament is validly prerogued, you know, again, a second time, or maybe or a first time

00:35:35.100 for real, I don't know, however you want to characterize it. And that would be that. So

00:35:41.500 so there's only a couple of options. But but unless Parliament is prerogued validly, our solution would

00:35:49.660 be that everything comes back, or in fact, nothing had left to begin with, right. And and so that I

00:35:56.620 understand may be of concern to some people, I share John's concerns with respect to the to Bill C 63.

00:36:05.100 For example, I find that that's a very, very serious bill with very, very, very, very serious

00:36:10.860 ramifications for our country. I'm not in favour of that bill at all from a from a charter of rights

00:36:16.300 point of view. But but if we're right, that bill will come back or will be there and will will will

00:36:27.020 never have died. It'll be up to the people in Parliament to vote down the government to have an

00:36:32.380 election. That's the best way of doing this is to dissolve Parliament and have an election.

00:36:37.580 Well, I think you submitted a very good case for that non confidence vote occurring in the government

00:36:45.020 being unable to avoid it, because a lot of people are concerned, as I said, that the government will

00:36:50.380 do anything to avoid that non confidence vote, just like Trudeau did everything he could to avoid

00:36:55.100 a non confidence vote in January, and clearly was was was able to do that. But if they are restrained

00:37:03.500 by finances, and if this is like what happens every year in the United States, when Congress runs out of

00:37:09.900 money and the government is on the verge of shutting down, right, that's never happened in Canada. So

00:37:16.620 no, that would be a very dangerous precedent. It would be it would be incredibly dangerous. In fact,

00:37:21.660 in fact, David, I have to say, I don't know if there is any reserve money. If that ever happened,

00:37:29.580 like, let's imagine that the we couldn't pass the supply bill. Imagine that for some reason. Is there any

00:37:37.500 money in some kitty somewhere for the Department of National Defense or for the Department of Foreign

00:37:42.460 Affairs, or for the Department of the of, you know, any of these departments to keep to keep the lights

00:37:48.220 on in the middle of a legislative crisis like this? I don't even know. I think there is extra money

00:37:55.740 emergency funding for the in in the states for the American system. I think they have extra extra money

00:38:03.100 that that can at least keep the lights on. I'm not sure that that's the case here in Canada. So

00:38:07.980 it could be extraordinarily problematic for the Canadian government if there's no supply bill.

00:38:14.460 And there is more. There is one more thing, David, I wanted to just just mention because I've seen a

00:38:20.540 couple of these comments on social media recently, some kind of a of a theory where the the government

00:38:29.580 would invoke the Emergencies Act for some reason upon coming back to to the House after

00:38:37.180 propagation is lifted and then somehow trying to, you know, connive away to stay in power beyond

00:38:44.860 October's Election Day, the fixed Election Day in October into the into a fifth year because people

00:38:51.340 people realize that constitutionally speaking, you don't have to have an election until every five years.

00:38:57.260 The Canada Elections Act, which is a piece of legislation provides for a four year fixed

00:39:04.940 election. But the Constitution says it could be five. And so people are are very concerned or some

00:39:12.220 people are very concerned that the government will somehow find a way to, you know, get a fifth year

00:39:19.740 out of this and not have an election till October 26. I find that a little bit far fetched. I just wanted to

00:39:26.940 make sure that the viewers understood that in my in my view. First of all, there wouldn't be an

00:39:32.860 emergency that would be that would that would necessitate the Emergencies Act. I mean, that is an

00:39:38.620 incredibly difficult thing to to have to do. In any event, both houses of parliament have to convene

00:39:47.580 and ratify the Emergencies Act declaration, which they probably wouldn't do because we're in a minority

00:39:53.180 parliament now. And everybody would see this ploy for what it would be. And thirdly, again, the money,

00:39:59.980 you'd have to come together and have a money bill, a supply bill, which would probably hamstring any

00:40:05.500 any type of of Emergencies Act gambit. And and fourthly, the Canada Elections Act does say there's

00:40:16.060 got to be an election every four years, which would be October of this year. So they'd have to repeal that

00:40:23.020 that Act. I mean, the Emergencies Act declaration doesn't suspend all the other pieces of legislation,

00:40:28.460 as far as I'm concerned. I think it would be very difficult for that to happen. So just to put

00:40:35.340 people's minds at ease about the Emergencies Act possibility, I don't think that that's something

00:40:40.780 worth worrying about. Well, that's that actually was another question I did for you so much for

00:40:48.620 bringing that up, because that is a concern. There is a potential for a protest in Ottawa next week

00:40:55.420 called Election Now. It's being labeled as Freedom Convoy 2.0. Some people are concerned that could be

00:41:02.220 construed as violent protests and a justification for the Emergencies Act. The only thing I would

00:41:08.780 question about your analysis there, James, is that Trudeau did not wait for the Senate to ratify

00:41:16.140 the Emergencies Act. It went through the House somewhat begrudgingly with the NDP.

00:41:22.140 Right. It was divided, but they eventually got enough support. But the Senate never passed the

00:41:27.500 Emergencies Act. Well, what happened was Justin Trudeau, Prime Minister Trudeau, he ended up revoking

00:41:33.020 the declaration right before it had a chance to pass the Senate. So it was a very quickly done,

00:41:39.660 quickly implemented and then quickly rescinded. So I hear you. I hear you that the Senate didn't have

00:41:48.540 a chance to confirm the declaration. But had it done so, then the emergency regulations, whatever

00:41:58.780 had been passed, could have extended for longer. But ultimately, I think Prime Minister Trudeau and

00:42:05.740 his government saw the writing on the wall with the Senate. I think, as I recall, and I don't have any

00:42:11.580 inside information. But as I recall, the Senate was not, it wasn't looking favorable that they were

00:42:17.100 going to actually approve it. So then I think, I think Prime Minister Trudeau pulled it. That's,

00:42:22.780 that's what I believe anyway. Okay, so he can implement it, but he can,

00:42:27.660 it can't be sustained. Right. That's right. That's right.

00:42:31.900 A lot of people were totally confused as the process. And we have to remember as well that

00:42:38.940 Justice Mosley of the Federal Court a year or so ago did find that the government's invocation of

00:42:46.700 the Emergencies Act had been unreasonable, that there wasn't any reasonable reasons to declare it

00:42:53.980 in the first place, right? I think we have to remember that very brave decision, in my view,

00:42:59.260 from the Federal Court. Yes, yes.

00:43:01.900 Well, James, thank you so much for your time today. This has been just a

00:43:05.500 pleasure talking to you about these issues and your assessment, your analysis. Much appreciated. I

00:43:11.340 know my viewers will love it. And I do intend to do a follow up article on this for the Post Millennial.

00:43:16.780 So thank you so much again. And you're always welcome back on this show. And I really appreciate

00:43:21.740 your input today. Thank you. Thanks again, David. One more quick plug, if you don't mind,

00:43:26.300 jccf.ca for all the viewers who want to donate to this court case, if they if they're so minded,

00:43:33.580 every bit counts, we don't we don't we everything we do for all of our all of our litigants is all

00:43:39.100 done through the generosity of our donations. So jccf.ca to check us out, see what we're doing and, and

00:43:46.140 perhaps be as generous as you might want to be. Thanks very much. Well, that information will be

00:43:54.300 in our description because this is one organization I have no hesitancy about supporting. Well, it's

00:43:59.820 very kind. Thank you. And I've always had good relations with with your group. So thank you so

00:44:04.300 much, James. Well, we'll see you again soon, I hope. Thank you, David. Anytime. Bye for now. Well,

00:44:10.940 folks, that's all for today. Thank you so much for joining us. And we will be back again tomorrow

00:44:18.380 with all the news you need to know. And so we can continue to resolve to resist. And let's hope this

00:44:25.580 challenge is court challenge is successful. And let's and as James said, support this organization,

00:44:32.620 they do great work. They're fighting for you. They're fighting for Canadians. And I've always

00:44:37.500 supported the work they do. So we'll be back again tomorrow. And let's keep fighting for freedom

00:44:44.220 in this country. It's the best thing to fight for. Don't drink the Kool-Aid, folks. Don't listen to

00:44:53.260 Justin Trudeau. We need this kind of added Canada right now, because let me tell you, Justin Trudeau will

00:45:00.700 fight tooth and nail to stay as leader of the Liberal Party and as Prime Minister of Canada. And

00:45:05.900 he will use every trick in the Liberal handbook to do that. So we have to be vigilant. And we have to

00:45:11.260 be have to have perseverance to fight this battle to the end. As I've been saying since this station

00:45:18.540 went on the air, we need to resolve to resist.

00:45:26.700 And we need to fight for our free speech and our democratic rights to say what we believe to speak.

00:45:35.020 As John D from Baker said, and don't forget that t-shirt that's available out there in the store.

00:45:40.220 I speak as a free Canadian, free to speak, free to believe in what I choose. And Justin Trudeau

00:45:47.500 is not going to interfere with that. Thanks for being a part of the Creighton's right resistance.

00:45:54.540 And we'll see you again soon. So we are in a very precarious position in this country.

00:45:58.860 We need a political change, but we also need to resolve to resist.

Stand on Guard with David Krayden - January 13, 2025

What YOU Need to Know： Justice Centre's Court Challenge Against Trudeau ｜ Stand on Guard (FULL Int)

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