What YOU Need to Know： Justice Centre's Court Challenge Against Trudeau ｜ Stand on Guard (FULL Int)
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Summary
In this episode, we speak with James Manson of the JCCF and Eris Lavranos of the Centre for Constitutional Freedoms about their challenge to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's prorogation of the Canadian Parliament.
Transcript
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Good morning. Welcome to another episode of Stand on Guard. I'm your host, David Creighton,
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and we will be joining James Manson very shortly of the Justice Center for Constitutional
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Freedoms. And we're looking forward to this because lots is happening. And I'm hearing
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a lot of people say, you know, we need, we definitely need some movement in Parliament
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right now because this could go on indefinitely. You know, I think that's, that's extremely
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relevant. And I think what James and the Senator are trying to do is essentially challenge this
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government to wake up. And it cannot dismiss Parliament. It has to be responsible to Parliament.
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I'm going to show you a bit of a clip to show you what is actually not happening right
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now with the Liberal leadership. Nobody wants to get on board. And I have found this absolutely
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fascinating. Ah, James is here. Great. Thanks for your patience this morning, folks. And
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Thanks very much, David. Good morning. Sorry about the technical difficulties just, just
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know. But here we are. Here we are. Yeah. So just in case anybody has any, any doubt of
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what's, what's going on here, that you are the lead attorney for the Justice Center for
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Constitutional Freedoms challenge to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's prorogation of Parliament.
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And you're acting on behalf of two individuals. I think this is quite interesting because this is
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not, you did not do this unilaterally as an organization, but you're responding to David
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McKinnon and Eris Lavranos, I believe from Nova Scotia or the Maritimes. And I guess my first
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question is, can you walk us through why you think this is even feasible? I understand it's
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based on a precedent in the UK with the UK Supreme Court saying Forrest Johnson should not have
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prorogued Parliament in 2019 around the Brexit agreement.
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Yes, David. Well, thanks. And let me just say hello to all of the viewers. You're quite
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right. We are lawyers from JCCF for the Justice Center for Constitutional Freedoms.
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Everybody can find us at jccf.ca. And a little bit of a quick plug, if anybody liked to support
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the case, certainly check us out. Again, jccf.ca. Anybody wishing to donate to the case would be
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much appreciated. David, turning to your question, we are acting for Eris and David out in Nova Scotia,
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a couple of concerned citizens, you know, who basically agreed and approached us to, you know,
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help them out. And in terms of the viability of the case, you're also quite right, David,
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this does relate to the 2019 Boris Johnson prorogation in the United Kingdom.
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And really, we're going to be doing the same thing as what happened back then in the UK.
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In case we've sort of forgotten what happened with Boris Johnson, back during the Brexit negotiations,
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back in 2019, we all may remember that there were eight weeks to go before a hard exit from
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the Brexit situation with the EU. And so there hadn't yet been an agreement with the, you know,
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between the UK and the EU. And people didn't know what was going to happen. And there could have been
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economic and political chaos coming out of that, had there not been an agreement. But anyway,
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in the midst of all of this, Prime Minister Johnson decided to prorogue Parliament for five weeks of
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the remaining eight weeks before the final day of exit. And so ultimately, that got challenged in
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the United Kingdom court system. And it made its way up to the Supreme Court very quickly within the
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space of a month. Within the space of a month, it went from a prorogation all the way to a decision
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from the Supreme Court. And that Supreme Court decision, David, excuse me, that decision from
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the Supreme Court basically found that Boris Johnson's prorogation was unlawful. And why was
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that? Well, basically, he never gave any reasons to the public for the prorogation. And so the UK
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Supreme Court said that there's a very important principle that we all knew about, and we still know
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about it's called parliamentary accountability. All right. That just means, David, that Parliament
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needs to be able to do its job. Parliament needs to be able to oversee and supervise the government
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of the day. And that means, of course, it has to be in session so that it can be in committees and
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be on the floor of the House of Commons to do, you know, to, you know, for the question period,
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things like that. And the UK Supreme Court found that because Prime Minister Johnson shut down
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Parliament for five of those eight weeks, Parliament couldn't do its job. And particularly
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at a very, very difficult, you know, period of time in the UK. So ultimately, they found that all of
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that meant that the Parliament had been unlawfully prorogued. And ultimately, they found that Parliament
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had never been prorogued. What the court said was, look, you know, the Prime Minister's advice to the
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Queen was unlawful. And it basically was a nullity, meaning that it had never happened. And therefore,
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Parliament had never been prorogued. And therefore, Parliament could go back to work the same or I guess
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it was the following day. So in the UK, Parliament resumed sitting right away. So when you pull that
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back then, David, to our case, you will see that, well, at least in our client's view, we will be
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we're in the same kettle of fish, David, basically, we're going to be saying that Prime Minister Trudeau's
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announcement last Monday, really gave a whole bunch of reasons that don't add up to reasonable
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justification. That was the catch word from the UK's decision. There's got to be a reasonable
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justification for the prorogation. And we're going to say that Prime Minister Trudeau's reasons don't
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add up to a reasonable justification. Well, I think most Canadians would probably
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concur with that assessment. I find it interesting that Justin Trudeau was on MSNBC over the weekend
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with Jen Psaki. And he was asked about prorogation. And does he think this is going to in any way
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impede his negotiations with President-elect Donald Trump? And of course, this tariff is
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coming next Monday, a week from today. There's nothing Trudeau is going to do in the next week
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to stop. And I think most Canadians realize that. But Trudeau responded, interestingly enough,
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he said, I have all the tools at my disposal that I need, even though Parliament's not sitting.
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The same time, Foreign Affairs Minister Melanie Jolie is on CTV's question period yesterday,
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and she's saying all political parties need to pull together right now in a show of unity.
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This is the same government that just dismissed all of these political parties from the House of
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Commons. And it's essentially silenced them in a very legislative way, at least. Yes, they're free
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to go to the media. But legislatively, they have been cut out of the process. And I think this is
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outrage Canadians, because this is clearly a political partisan move on behalf of Justin Trudeau.
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Anybody can see that. He talked about this being a great reset, which reminded me of things he said
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before about great resets. But I don't think... Do you think the Governor General, Mary Simon,
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had a choice? When Trudeau came to her and said, I want to prorogue Parliament, apparently it took her
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about 10 seconds to make her mind about that. And she literally came back and said, go ahead.
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Not even thinking. She didn't even take an hour to think about it. But do you think... Did she have a...
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Did she have the constitutional authority to say, no, there's no reason for this? And as Governor
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General, I'm saying, no, that's my role. That's my constitutional authority. So David, I think you
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raised a couple of interesting and excellent points. And there's a couple of things that I want to say
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just off the bat in response. Number one, I want to make it clear to the viewers that this court
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challenge that we're doing is not based in political considerations. We're talking about a legal
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and a constitutional challenge. Our clients are more concerned not with the government of the day
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and who happens to be in charge and whether Prime Minister Trudeau is a bad politician or a good
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leader or what. This has nothing to do with that. This is more about the entire working of the
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constitutional order in our government, in our system. It doesn't matter whether it's a conservative
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Prime Minister or a Liberal Prime Minister or any other Prime Minister. The question that this lawsuit
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seeks to answer is, what are those limits? What are the limits of a Prime Minister's power to dissolve,
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or not dissolve, prorogue Parliament, pardon me? What are those limits? Because there must be some limits.
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Naturally, I think everybody would agree that a Prime Minister can't just prorogue Parliament forever.
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So that means there must be some limits. Well, what are those limits? That is an important question
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that's never been answered before here in Canada. And I think it's very important for all Canadians,
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and also politicians, future Prime Ministers, to understand exactly how far they can go to use this
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extraordinary tool called prorogation. So David, then turning to your next question with respect to the
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Governor General. My view is that we don't want to be testing or criticizing the Governor General
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for agreeing to the advice given by the Prime Minister. Over time, David, what's happened,
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of course, in our society, or rather in our government, is that the Prime Minister has become the, you know,
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the person who wields all the power. We don't really have a Governor General who's got any real
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particular power in this case. And I don't think we want that. I don't think we want to have a Governor
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General that can stop for a minute, think about things and then say, you know what, no, I'm not
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going to do it. That would be extraordinary. For Governor General Mary Simon, in this case,
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to stand up to Prime Minister Trudeau, shall we say, and say, no, Prime Minister, I'm not going to
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grant you prorogation because, for whatever reason, now we have a different power base in our
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government. We have a Governor General who is saying no to the democratically elected people,
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right? We must remember, David, that nobody elected Governor General Simon, nobody elected the King.
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Of course, she's the King's representative here in Canada. And I don't think we want to be,
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you know, moving back to the olden times when the King had unlimited authority to stop the
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democratic processes of the government. Naturally, I appreciate that some people are very unhappy with
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the way this all went down. And, you know, perhaps they're quite unhappy with the way the government
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has gone on for the last few years or even the entire time. I appreciate that. But I don't think that
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that has caused to call upon another person, for example, the Governor General, to sort of overrule
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the Prime Minister's decision. Whether we can get there depends on, at least in my view,
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on the success of this case and whether the Prime Minister's limits, whether those limits of power,
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first of all, what are they? And secondly, once we answer that question, we will then ask,
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did the Prime Minister's decision on Monday exceed whatever that test turns out to be? I think
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that's the more democratic and better way of going about this.
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You know, so you're saying the impetus should be on the courts, not the Governor General,
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if this is an abuse of prorogation, that the courts need to intervene, not the Governor General?
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I think that's the better view, David, because think about it this way. All of the viewers who
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are maybe, you know, secretly hoping that the Governor General might step in and might do something,
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maybe if they have the government that they want next time, they wouldn't want the Governor General
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to be doing the same thing to their Prime Minister. So we can't really have it that way. I don't think
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that would be very good. Yeah, because when I first commented on this a couple of days before it
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actually happened, I didn't expect this to happen so quickly. I thought she would take a couple of
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days. I think I encouraged people to correspond and say, please think about this decision. You know,
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the Honourable Governor shall be respectful, but ask her please to think about it, at least.
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Because my mind went back to 1926. And anybody who knows Canadian history would know that Mackenzie
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King, Prime Minister Mackenzie King went to Governor General Bing at that time and said,
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I want to dissolve Parliament. I can no longer sustain my minority government, my coalition. He was
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working with the progressives at the time. Lord Bing of Vimy, and this was a highly respected
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individual, a war hero from the Great War. He said to Mackenzie King, I can't dissolve Parliament,
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because there's another option. The conservative opposition should be asked to form a government.
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And constitutional scholars all agree that Lord Bing was correct in his assessment, that he had the
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constitutional authority to do that. However, I think as you would probably point out, the public
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relations follow, even in 1926, was horribly against the Governor General, because it looked like he was
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usurping the power of the democratically elected Prime Minister. So I think I take your point here.
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This might, you know, might not be the best way. So I guess that gets me to the next question.
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Do you think you can win this in a reasonable amount of time?
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I think that our constitution here in Canada is very similar to that of the United Kingdom. In fact,
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our constitution, David, as you may know, contains a preamble and the preamble of the constitution here
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basically explicitly says that our constitution is supposed to be based in principle similar in, you
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know, in principle to that of the UK. And that's, of course, because of our shared legal history,
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you know, and constitutional history over the years. So what happened in the UK, that case back in 2019
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with Boris Johnson, we don't see any principle difference between what happened then and what
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happened here in terms of the actual, you know, constitutional rules that ought to be, you know,
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set down. In the UK case, once again, it wasn't an earth shattering case, to be honest, what the
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Supreme Court said was simply, the Prime Minister's got to have a pretty good reason to shut down
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Parliament for a period of time. This is the democratically elected body. And of course, David,
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we have to remember that Parliament is the supreme body in Canada in the federal system,
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not the government, right? Parliament's duty, again, is to oversee and check and supervise
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the government. And so anyway, the Supreme Court said that, you know, that is an important function.
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And so in order for the executive to shut down the legislative branch for a period of time,
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there's got to be a reasonable justification. I don't think that that's too much to ask for the
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Prime Minister to have some kind of a good reason. And so then we have to turn to the actual reasons
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that the Prime Minister put forward last week. Well, there's a couple of them, aren't there?
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There's the leadership race, you know, argument. And there's the argument where he said that he
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wants to reset Parliament. And let's take the first one first. In terms of a leadership race,
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our client's view, David, is that that is not a reasonable justification in and of itself. Because
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really, when you're talking about having a leadership race for the leader of the party,
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that's a party matter, right? That's not a government matter. We have to remember, of course,
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David, that political parties are really nothing more than a collection of people that have the same
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views, right? Once you get elected into government, now, the people who form the cabinet,
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they are ministers of the Crown, they are not ministers of the Liberal Party. So ultimately,
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when you're having a leadership race for your party, that's an internal matter. That's what our
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clients will argue anyway. And we will say that that's got nothing to do with the business of the
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actual government. I mean, the Liberal Party on Monday afternoon last week could have pointed it
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pointed to any of their members and said, this is the new interim leader. And this is going to be the
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new Prime Minister and that's it. And then that Prime Minister could have gone back to Parliament
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the next day and faced the opposition. But that's not what happened, of course. So our view is that the
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first reason doesn't pass muster. The second reason, David, is to reset Parliament.
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Now, here's the tricky part a little bit. Oftentimes, resetting Parliament is a valid reason
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for having a prorogation. Because what happens is, a government may reach the end of its legislative
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agenda, they may have a few ideas for what bills to pass and what to do. And then they reach the
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end of that agenda, all the bills they wanted to pass got passed, everything they wanted to, you know,
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put forward got put forward. And they're at the end. So now they need to go back to the Cabinet
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departments. And all the, you know, Cabinet ministers have to go back to their people
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and come up with new ideas, new legislative proposals, new policy issue areas that they
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want to start legislating on. And then they have to write a new speech from the throne. And they have
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to, you know, breathe some more life into the government and then carry on. And that's okay.
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Normally, that's a that's a legislative reset. And that's usually happens, you know, during each
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Parliament, not really a big deal. But here's the thing, David. Number one, it doesn't last 11 weeks.
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Number two, we're not talking here about a legislative reset. Prime Minister Trudeau on on Monday was
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talking about just a reset because of the tone, or because it was paralyzed or because, you know,
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everything was toxic in Parliament, and that everybody had to rate had to lower the temperature,
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I think, to use the Prime Minister's words. Well, in my view, I think in my client's view, again,
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I'm not sure that that is a reasonable justification, because there are other more
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democratic and more, you know, probably impactful ways to lower the temperature, it would be called
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having an election. Why couldn't why couldn't the Prime Minister simply dissolve Parliament
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and call for an election that would that would probably take care of the paralysis in Parliament.
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Obviously, you know, my clients read the polls as well as everybody else. And we understand that
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if there were an election today, likely the Conservatives would win. But it doesn't matter
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that it's the Conservatives that might win. We're just saying that there could be an easy fix to this
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without shutting down Parliament for 11 weeks. The other thing, of course, is why 11 weeks, if all if
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everyone just has to take a breather and lower the temperature, why is 11 weeks the necessary timeframe?
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Why couldn't it be two weeks or three weeks? We must remember again, David, every day that goes by,
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Parliament cannot do its job. And of course, we still haven't mentioned the incoming economic threat
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from President-elect Donald Trump. That is a big deal. That is a serious deal. Now, we don't know,
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of course, whether President-elect Trump will actually impose a tariff, but all signs point to yes.
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So this is the backdrop, of course, against which Parliament, again, can't do anything. They can't,
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they can't do anything right now to support the government to pass any new legislation to ratify
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an agreement that might be become necessary to ratify all these types of things, including simply
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standing up and asking questions on behalf of Canadians to the ministers who are apparently
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now running around in the in the States and everywhere else, talking about things like,
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you know, energy, you know, banning energy to go to the States. I think they were talking about that
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yesterday. All kinds of things that are on the table, apparently said the foreign, I think it was the
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Foreign Affairs Minister. Well, these are all naturally of great concern to Canadians. And at the moment,
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as I say, Parliament can't do anything to help with the situation. And so that is obviously a real
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problem. So long, long answer to your question, do you think we can win? Yes, I do think we can win,
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because I think in our view, the reasons given by the Prime Minister don't add up to a reasonable
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justification. And that violates the test laid out by the Supreme Court of the UK. And one more thing,
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David, before I turn it back to you, sorry. We have to understand as well that the UK's decision
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isn't binding on our courts, right? I want the viewers to be clear about that. The UK's decision
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is only a helpful analytical tool that we can use here. We're going to be inviting the court here in
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Canada to accept that reasoning. It's not binding, of course, but we'll we'll be making that pitch to the
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court. Well, you mentioned the fact that it was Melanie Jolie saying everything's on the table,
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including energy. I think Daniel Smith, Premier Daniel Smith of Alberta, would argue that that's
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ultra varies, is that the government, federal government has no right to say that energy is
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on the table. That's provincial jurisdiction. But this is why I, you know, I totally agree with what
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you're doing here, because this situation is fraught with so many difficulties. And there's just no
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response except through the media right now. And there's no legislative ability. And any kid who has
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taken high school history of Canada knows that our democracy is based on responsible government,
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that the executive branch is responsible to the legislative branch, which, of course,
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isn't happening right now. There is no legislative branch meeting. That's right. You know, a lot of
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people think that the government's not operating because parliament, of course it is, but it's
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operating by decree, which, of course, is how dictatorships function. That's right. That's right. David,
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David, I wanted to just interject. Yes, I'm sorry to do that. But but your comment made me think about
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a conversation I had yesterday with another citizen. And I was telling her about the case. And
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she felt a little bit uncomfortable with what we were trying to do because of this grave economic
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threat coming from the states right now. She said, I don't know that this is the right time to plunge
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Canadians into an election. I mean, if you're right, James, she said, then there's going to be people
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are going to go back to parliament. There's probably going to be a non-confidence motion right away.
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And then there's going to be an election. And that's not the right time to have an election
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in the middle of all this economic turmoil. I mean, don't we need people to be dealing with this
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rather than, you know, having all these shenanigans with respect to an election?
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And while I take that point a little bit, David, your comment just now about, you know, tyranny
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and authoritarian government and ruling by decree, that was in my mind when when that person made
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those comments to me, because my answer was, I understand it's tough, but our constitution must prevail.
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The constitutional order that we've got must prevail. Parliament must be able to do its job,
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and they might make a hash of it. It's true. It's possible that that, you know, we end up muddling
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through. But the the actual order, the actual way things things are supposed to work, it has to work,
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because if it doesn't work, if the prime minister can simply shut down parliament whenever he or she wants,
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for whatever reason, then we are in a situation where the executive has prior has absolute priority
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to do whatever it wants. That cannot be acceptable in our country. So even though things may be difficult
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with the whole economic threat, the the what's going on in this case, and these issues raised,
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in my view, I think in my client's view, are are even more important. I'm sorry to have interjected there,
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David, but that was what I was thinking when you made your comment.
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Not at all. That's what you're here for, because you're the expert. I'm merely commenting as a
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journalist who has certainly had some interest in this area for quite some time. But I find this
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extremely, extremely problematic. And a lot of people are asking me if they do manage to have a
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leadership convention, and they do manage to elect a new leader, and I'm not entirely convinced this game
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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,
00:43:01.900
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
00:45:26.700
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.