Canadian Parliament Research Articles

Assisted Human Reproduction in Common Law Canada after the Supreme Court of Canada Reference: Moving beyond Regulation by Colleges of Physicians and Surgeons

The Supreme Court of Canada’s opinion in Reference re Assisted Human Reproduction Act effectively decided that it was for provinces and territories to regulate most aspects of assisted human reproduction. Since the 2010 ruling, only Québec has passed legislation to govern the field. Although two colleges of physicians and surgeons have adopted medical practice guidelines, approximately forty-two fertility clinics in common law Canada lack detailed regulatory oversight. This article argues that such lack of specific regulation of assisted human reproduction in common law provinces is a waste of the public money and effort invested since the 1980s. Further, physician colleges are ill positioned to be the sole provincial regulator of practices and procedures conducted primarily on women’s bodies that aim to bring new humans to life. Provincial legislatures in common law Canada should urgently adopt the values expressed both by the Royal Commission on New Reproductive Technologies and by the Canadian Parliament and use similarly open and transparent processes. They ought to collaborate to adopt a regulatory mechanism (similar to that pioneered by the Uniform Conference of Canada or adopted in securities regulation) to govern assisted human reproduction in common law Canada primarily in the interests of women and the children to be created.

The Freedom to Offend? How the "Mohammad Cartoon Controversy" Has Influenced Public Debate on Canada's Hate Speech Regulation

The Mohammad cartoon controversy began in Denmark in 2006 when a Danish newspaper, Jyllands-Posten, published twelve cartoons, the majority of which depicted the Islamic Prophet Mohammad. Denmark had already been engaged with questions about Islam's compatibility with Danish culture, and the murder of Theo Van Gogh made international headlines in 2004. Writer Kare Bluitgen's failed attempt to find an illustrator for his children's book about Mohammad prompted public debate.1 This debate revolved around self-censorship, and the publication of twelve cartoons of Mohammad was the response of the editorial department of Jyllands-Posten. The initial reaction was local, limited to discussion and a few protests, the largest of which included 5,000 peaceful protesters.2 It wasn't until a delegation of Danish imams went on a tour of the Middle East with a dossier including the cartoons that it sparked many protests, some peaceful, some violent, and subsequently became a global story. An interesting element of the controversy is how it started as a consideration of reactions to the images of Mohammad, yet it spawned a variety of other controversies, such as the acceptability of republishing the images at the center of the main story to accurately address the major controversy. In Canada, controversy surrounding the republishing of the Mohammad cartoons led to a national discussion on the purpose, legitimacy, and usefulness of Section 13, the hate speech regulation, of Canada's Human Rights Act and its implementation by the Canadian Human Rights Commissions. This discussion subsequently resulted in the Parliament of Canada's vote to repeal the controversial hate speech law in June 2012.

Two Roads Diverged: A Comparative Analysis of Indigenous Rights in a North American Constitutional Context

Fuelled by contrasting political backdrops, indigenous tribes on opposite sides of what has become the Canadian-American border have travelled upon very different trajectories, receiving dissimilar treatment from the respective governments that have laid claim to their lands. Indian tribes in the United States have sometimes had progressive legislators and high-ranking government officials enact bold laws and policies that were instrumental in creating positive change. Inversely, Aboriginal peoples in Canada have generally had to muddle through decade after decade of middling, indifferent, or occasionally even malicious bureaucrats who have continued to be too sheepish or backward-thinking to make any significant improvements. Further, the Canadian Parliament has yet to offer any substantive legislation in the vein and magnitude of that which was vital in making positive changes for American Indian tribes, even though numerous independent sources have pointed to such an approach. Rather, decades of piecemeal legislation have served only as a half-hearted attempt to counter the more odious effects of the archaic Indian Act, while those laudable governmental voices that have called for bold, substantial change have been largely ignored.

Canadian Parliament Must Act on Assisted Human Reproduction

In the past three months, three members of the Board of Directors of Assisted Human Reproduction Canada (AHRC) have resigned. Their resignation letters include the following statements: '[that following requests for information about the Agency's spending and budget] there was much reluctance and procrastination in providing information, and that when the information was provided, there were inconsistencies in what I received and what was originally presented. This raises concerns in my mind about the prudence and diligence in managing public funds'; 'I have encountered difficulties as a board member in receiving satisfactory replies to concerns and questions I have raised which recently included audits and contracts. What I have been witness to is a resistance to give full and straightforward answers when questions and requests for clarification were made'; and 'I am unable to fulfill the duties entrusted to me in a manner that satisfies my conscience and my integrity.' This set of resignations is cause for serious concern and requires urgent attention from the federal Parliamentary Standing Committee on Health and Parliament itself.

Compassionate use of cell products

Compassionate use of cell products

Próby modernizacji pozycji i funkcjonowania parlamentów w warunkach kryzysowych

The 2007+ financial crisis, which also had an impact on real economy, paradoxically resulted in an increase of states’ activity in economy and in the growth of expectations of citizens towards states. The crisis makes them see the state as the only institution able to guarantee financial and social safety as well as orderly development of global economy in future. The article tries to answer the following question: is the state able to secure that feeling of safety and society’s ability to develop, and will the incoming crises influence the modification of horizontal and vertical extent of functions of the modern state? The question whether modern states modernize or not, disregarding economic, social, cultural and military crises, is also a subject of preliminary analysis. The 2007+ economic crisis caused an increase in state activities in fields both related to economic problems and providing social and financial safety for citizens. The modernization of state institutions (the state considered as ontological being, i.e. is not identified with any present day state) is not related to crises. The internal institutions of state, as parliaments and executive are also modernized to a certain extent. The analyses of Scandinavian, US and Canadian parliaments included in the article prove that the parliaments use the legislative possibilities and increase the scope of control activities performed during crisis. Occasionally this leads to constitution infringement (US Congress). On other occasions special parliamentary commissions and direct democracy institutions are used (Iceland). During a crisis a phenomenon of „financial world imperialism” emerges. It is something more than financialization of real economy (industrial, services and agriculture). It is a trend leading to the subordination of all the other spheres of activity of states and societies, including politics, law and culture. It is observed in contemporary highly developed societies as well as in some countries of „peripheral capitalism”. This trend is visible when democracy is used, including parliamentary procedures and decision-making processes in executive, to advance special interests of the financial world, its continuity and its profits.

Incumbency advantages in the Canadian Parliament

Abstract We apply a regression discontinuity approach to determine incumbency advantages in the Canadian Parliament, finding that incumbents enjoy a 9.4–11.2% increased probability of winning over non‐incumbents. Owing to the presence of multiple parties, an incumbency advantage in terms of vote share does not always translate to an increased probability of winning, because incumbents do not necessarily obtain votes from their closest opponent. Also, under the assumption that strategic exit is not an issue, we are able to split the incumbency advantage into party incumbency and individual candidate incumbency components, finding that the advantage is almost entirely due to the individual.

Ted Hsu: From physics PhD to Canadian parliament

<xhtml:span xmlns:xhtml="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" xml:lang="en"> A former nuclear physicist and investment banker now represents the district of Kingston and the Islands, Ontario, in Canada's House of Commons. </xhtml:span>

An introduction to the International Brain Research Organization: IBRO's beginnings

At the dawn of modern neuroscience—midway through the 20th century—the International Brain Research Organization (IBRO) was already in the ether. It was a time filled with both difficulty and optimism: in the aftermath of the Second World War and during the emerging Cold War, science played a critical role in trying to bridge communities that were separated by political dissent. The seeds of IBRO took root during various scientific meetings occurring in the late 1940s and the 1950s, starting with a meeting of electroencephalographers in London in 1947. Momentum built as neuroscientists in many countries expressed a need for a central organization that would cut across world boundaries and improve communication and collaboration among brain researchers. At the 1958 Moscow Colloquium of EEG and Higher Nervous Activity, there was unanimous support for a resolution proposing the creation of an international organization representing brain research worldwide. In 1960, the Canadian Parliament discussed a bill to approve the charter that created IBRO, and formally established the organization in 1961, the same year in which construction began on the Berlin Wall. Working out of his office at the Montreal Neurological Institute of McGill University, Canada, IBRO's first Secretary-General Herbert Jasper and other IBRO volunteers focused their early efforts on creating a worldwide registry of neuroscientists. At the same time, they were negotiating resources and facilities that would allow IBRO to continue to grow and develop. UNESCO offered to settle IBRO in Paris, providing an office and budget. …

For God and Gaga: Comparing the Same-Sex Marriage Discourse and Homonationalism in Canada and the United States

For God and Gaga: Comparing the Same-Sex Marriage Discourse and Homonationalism in Canada and the United States

Screening for hepatocellular carcinoma: The rationale for the American Association for the Study of Liver Diseases recommendations

Screening for hepatocellular carcinoma: The rationale for the American Association for the Study of Liver Diseases recommendations

The Atrophy of Constitutional Powers

In many constitutional regimes, constitutional powers atrophy over time. Although at one point such a power is explicitly established in a written constitution or solidly based in constitutional conventions, the power gradually sinks into desuetude, and at a later time actors in the legal system declare its use illegitimate or assert that a constitutional convention now prohibits its exercise. Examples of atrophied powers – listed roughly from most clearly atrophied to less clearly so -- include the royal veto in the United Kingdom, the power of the Canadian federal government to disallow provincial laws, the power of the U.S. Congress to expand the number of Supreme Court justices (court-packing), the notwithstanding clause that authorizes the Canadian Parliament to override judicial decisions, and congressional impeachment of executive officers. I will try to offer some mid-level generalizations about the atrophy phenomenon. On this account, the common dynamic is slippage in the modal status of power: a power that is not exercised tends, over time, to become unexercisable. I offer several stylized hypotheses, each based on a different causal mechanism, that might explain this pattern. The common theme is that when a power goes unexercised over some sufficiently long period, its use comes to seem illegitimate to boundedly informed publics (including elites who lack relevant specialized knowledge). Such publics use a political precedent heuristic, according to which an attempt to revive the power at a later time amounts to an illegitimate attempt to change the rules of the political game. I then elicit implications for constitutional actors who wish to prevent the atrophy of particular constitutional powers. Actors in this situation would do well to engage in pointless exercises of power -- a form of deliberate precedent-setting in which the power is exercised merely to preserve its existence for the future. By way of illustration, I apply this point to legislative power to overturn or override constitutional or quasi-constitutional decisions of the judiciary, with special reference to judicial review under the Human Rights Act in the United Kingdom. This advice can also be turned on its head for actors who wish to hasten the atrophy of constitutional powers.

Legislative Access to Intelligence Information: Lessons from the United States and Canada

In theory, legislatures can perform critical oversight functions regarding all government agencies, including intelligence agencies. But governments have traditionally resisted giving legislatures access to the information they would need to provide effective oversight, and legislators have largely acquiesced to the executive’s tight control over intelligence information. That was the situation in the United States up until the mid-1970s, when news reports about the Central Intelligence Agency’s illegal activities against U.S. citizens led to the creation of two ad hoc Congressional committees to investigate those abuses and eventually to two permanent committees of intelligence oversight. While the Congressional committees do not have access to all intelligence information, Congressionally-created Inspectors General (IGs) in intelligence agencies have greater access and can serve indirectly as the eyes and ears of Congress in those agencies. The Canadian Parliament has not been energetic in its oversight of the three main agencies that perform intelligence functions. Parliamentary committees do not have direct access to intelligence information, and members of Parliament have not had access to classified information. On the other hand, Parliament did create independent review bodies for each of these intelligence agencies. Those review bodies have access to classified intelligence information and have been able to provide some oversight. The review bodies report their findings to a government minister, but their reports are generally scrubbed of classified information before being forwarded to Parliament. The oversight situation in Canada may be changing as the result of a recent scandal. Allegations regarding the Canadian military’s treatment of Afghan detainees led Parliament to create an ad hoc investigative committee, and Parliament ensured that this committee have access to classified information. Canada’s experience with this ad hoc parliamentary investigation of intelligence may lead to a similar but permanent approach.

The Sad Tale of Fred Rose, Stalin's Man in the True North

In the summer of 1943, Fred Rose, a candidate for the Labour Progressive Party, a Communist Party alias, was elected to the Canadian Parliament in a by-election in the federal constituency of Carti...

Canadian Firearms Legislation and Effects on Homicide 1974 to 2008

Canada has implemented legislation covering all firearms since 1977 and presents a model to examine incremental firearms control. The effect of legislation on homicide by firearm and the subcategory, spousal homicide, is controversial and has not been well studied to date. Legislative effects on homicide and spousal homicide were analyzed using data obtained from Statistics Canada from 1974 to 2008. Three statistical methods were applied to search for any associated effects of firearms legislation. Interrupted time series regression, ARIMA, and Joinpoint analysis were performed. Neither were any significant beneficial associations between firearms legislation and homicide or spousal homicide rates found after the passage of three Acts by the Canadian Parliament--Bill C-51 (1977), C-17 (1991), and C-68 (1995)--nor were effects found after the implementation of licensing in 2001 and the registration of rifles and shotguns in 2003. After the passage of C-68, a decrease in the rate of the decline of homicide by firearm was found by interrupted regression. Joinpoint analysis also found an increasing trend in homicide by firearm rate post the enactment of the licensing portion of C-68. Other factors found to be associated with homicide rates were median age, unemployment, immigration rates, percentage of population in low-income bracket, Gini index of income equality, population per police officer, and incarceration rate. This study failed to demonstrate a beneficial association between legislation and firearm homicide rates between 1974 and 2008.

Coalition voting and minority governments in Canada

Inter-party voting coalitions in three minority cabinets were analysed: the 38th (2004–05), 39th (2006–08) and 40th (2008–11) Federal Canadian Parliaments. The paper begins by developing a simple theory to explain the formation of voting coalitions. The theory predicts that electoral incentives and policy issues drive minority government support. The main contention is that voting coalitions are more likely to form along ideological lines, as proposed by Axelrod [(1970) The Conflict of Interest (Chicago: Markham)]. However, the analysis also demonstrates that voting coalitions form along a second dimension in the Canadian Parliament, mainly on issues related to federalism and the province of Quebec. Some evidence is also provided to show that expected electoral gains could explain why certain parties choose to support the government more, despite ideological incentives.

Legislative Voting in the Canadian Parliament

Abstract.We analyze legislative voting in the 35th (1994–1997), 38th (2004–2005), and 39th (2006–2008) Canadian Parliaments. Using Poole's (2005) optimal classification algorithm, we locate MPs and their parties in a two-dimensional geometric model. The first dimension represents the division between governing and opposition parties that has been found in similar parliamentary systems. The second dimension captures the opposition between the Bloc Québécois and the rest of the legislature. We find a clear separation between the Reform party (and later the Conservative party) and the Bloc Québécois in the 35th and 38th Parliaments, with the Liberal and the New Democratic parties occupying the centre. However, in the 39th Parliament, the ordering changes with the Conservatives and the New Democrats near the centre, and Liberal and Bloc MPs occupying the extremes. We explain this change by the capacity of the governing party to control the legislative agenda and the recent minority governments in the House of Commons.Résumé.Nous analysons le vote législatif au trente-cinquième (1994–1997), au trente-huitième (2004–2005) et au trente-neuvième (2006–2008) Parlement canadien. En utilisant la méthode de classification optimale développée par Poole (2005), nous situons les députés de la Chambre des communes et leurs partis dans un modèle géométrique comprenant deux dimensions. La première dimension représente le conflit entre le gouvernement et les partis d'opposition que l'on retrouve également dans d'autres systèmes parlementaires, alors que la seconde dimension correspond à l'opposition régionale qui existe entre le Bloc Québécois et les partis fédéraux. Nous constatons une nette polarité entre le Parti réformiste (et plus tard le Parti conservateur) et le Bloc Québécois au trente-cinquième et au trente-huitième Parlement, alors que le Parti libéral et le Nouveau Parti démocratique se trouvent au centre. Cependant, au trente-neuvième Parlement, nous observons un changement dans la polarité régionale, puisque ce sont maintenant les Libéraux et les Bloquistes qui occupent les deux extrémités, alors que les Conservateurs et les Néodémocrates se situent au centre. Nous expliquons ces mouvements par la capacité du gouvernement de contrôler l'agenda législatif et par les récents gouvernements minoritaires à la Chambre des communes.

Multilevel Parliaments in Canada and Europe

In recent decades, political scientists have engaged intense debates about changes governance the modern state. Confronted with globalization, regionalization, and increasing functional differentiation of societies, governments have to manage interdependence by coordinating policies across territorial borders. But while policymaking is increasingly deterritorialized, democratic institutions remain organized on a territorial basis. Accountability of the to parliaments continues to constitute the institutional core of democracy. Hence, with the rise of multilevel governance, the close linkage between effective governance and democratic government has dissolved.In transnational federations like the EU and federal nation-states, this incongruence is hardly new. In Canada, scholars have characterized the evolution of intergovernmental relations between the federal and provincial governments as executive federalism. On the other side of the Atlantic, Andrew Moravcsik's conclusion that European integration strengthened the executives of nation-states found many supporters.1 While the powers of the European parliament have been extended, national parliaments have appeared to lose power during the integration process, not unlike what has been observed with regard to provincial parliaments Canada.These challenges to parliaments are similar national and supranational federations.2 Yet institutional conditions and the impact of multilevel governance differ. Canada and Europe provide highly interesting cases for comparative study, which can help us to better understand the current dilemmas that arise with the transformation of democracy multilevel systems. In contrast to Canada, where parliamentary systems exist at the federal and provincial level, the European federation in the making still lacks the institutional conditions of a well-established democracy at the central level. The parliament, directly elected since 1979, has now received co-decision rights important areas of legislation, but the council, the assembly of member-state executives, continues to hold primary legislative power. Elections to the parliament regularly turn out to be second order elections.3This particular constitutional quality explains why national parliaments have always been accorded an important role asserting the democratic legitimacy of European policymaking. They have responded to executive federalism European-style. Instead of merely claiming veto power, they developed a broad set of instruments to effectively participate multilevel governance, particular through establishing relations with other national parliaments and to the European parliament. In Canada, this trend towards interparliamentary relations is much weaker, despite a continuous evolution of intergovernmental relations and despite concerns about a democratic deficit.Given these variations, an inquiry into both cases can help us to better understand and explain the interplay between federalism, multilevel governance, and democracy. Such a comparative approach reveals different responses of European and Canadian parliaments to multilevel policymaking. Variations can be traced back to particular mechanisms of intra- and intergovernmental politics. By considering the dynamic interplay of these mechanisms, we can gain new perspectives on multilevel democracy beyond the common skeptical perceptions emphasizing deficits. We can discover institutional learning and adaptation, which are driven by tensions between inter- and intrago vemmental arenas. The next section describes these tensions greater detail and is followed by an analysis of their consequences.TENSIONS BETWEEN MULTILEVEL GOVERNANCE AND PARLIAMENTARY DEMOCRACYBy dividing and sharing powers, multilevel political systems per se imply differentiation and interdependence. But with recent changes state functions, public policies, and the national and international economy and society, the traditional two-level structure federal states has turned into more complex patterns of governance. …

The Atrophy of Constitutional Powers

In many constitutional regimes, constitutional powers atrophy over time. Although at one point such a power is explicitly established in a written constitution or solidly based in constitutional conventions, the power gradually sinks into desuetude, and at a later time actors in the legal system declare its use illegitimate or assert that a constitutional convention now prohibits its exercise. Examples of atrophied powers – listed roughly from most clearly atrophied to less clearly so -- include the royal veto in the United Kingdom, the power of the Canadian federal government to disallow provincial laws, the power of the U.S. Congress to expand the number of Supreme Court justices (court-packing), the notwithstanding clause that authorizes the Canadian Parliament to override judicial decisions, and congressional impeachment of executive officers. I will try to offer some mid-level generalizations about the atrophy phenomenon. On this account, the common dynamic is slippage in the modal status of power: a power that is not exercised tends, over time, to become unexercisable. I offer several stylized hypotheses, each based on a different causal mechanism, that might explain this pattern. The common theme is that when a power goes unexercised over some sufficiently long period, its use comes to seem illegitimate to boundedly informed publics (including elites who lack relevant specialized knowledge). Such publics use a political precedent heuristic, according to which an attempt to revive the power at a later time amounts to an illegitimate attempt to change the rules of the political game. I then elicit implications for constitutional actors who wish to prevent the atrophy of particular constitutional powers. Actors in this situation would do well to engage in pointless exercises of power -- a form of deliberate precedent-setting in which the power is exercised merely to preserve its existence for the future. By way of illustration, I apply this point to legislative power to overturn or override constitutional or quasi-constitutional decisions of the judiciary, with special reference to judicial review under the Human Rights Act in the United Kingdom. This advice can also be turned on its head for actors who wish to hasten the atrophy of constitutional powers.

Intellectual Property Colloquium Series: Canada and the Three-Step Test: A Step in Which Direction?

It is a real pleasure and honor to be here with you and to have an opportunity to talk about copyright reform in Canada. In particular, since this reform process is taking place with a particular international perspective in mind, it should provide an opportunity to discuss the relationship between national law and international norms in the field of copyright law. At the same time, I should like to give some sort of introduction to Canadian copyright law because, even though we are part of the same copyright law family, there are some differences between our two countries. These distinctions mean that some of the issues that will be raised today may be treated somewhat differently in U.S. law. As you know, of course, copyright law was born with technology and initially started in order to regulate printing in England. This year, we are celebrating the 300th anniversary of the first Copyright Act in the world, the Statute of Anne, which really is the mother of all copyright legislations, particularly in the common law, English-speaking world. And because it is the original reference in copyright law, some of the features of the Statute of Anne have continued in both U.S. copyright law and in what I call Commonwealth copyright law, that is, copyright law derived from England outside the United States. The distinction between copyright law derived from the United States and other Commonwealth states occurred because the United States gained independence much earlier than the other British colonies. The U.S. law that first developed, however, retained some features of the Statute of Anne. For instance, if one looks at the term of protection that existed here in the United States before 1976, it was a term of protection that depended upon registration--it initially lasted for twenty-eight years and was renewable for a second twenty-eight year term. Such a mechanism is a direct descendent of the Statute of Anne where the term ran for fourteen years from registration, with an additional fourteen year period. A shift took place in England. Perhaps because it is part of Europe, England has been subject to some continental influences as, for instance, with respect to the term of protection. To wit, in 1842, the old system of a set term renewable for a second set term was replaced by a term of protection of life plus seven years. Thus, in England, a term of protection based on the author's life was introduced already in 1842. The 19th century in England witnessed many other kinds of evolutions: copyright law expanded because people realized that it was not just about printing, but also about other forms of artistic expressions. Moreover, because of its role a colonial power, English copyright laws were applied throughout the British Empire. This dominance culminated in 1911 with the Imperial Copyright Act, (1) which was similar to a restatement of all previous copyright legislation into one act. This Act was made to be applicable to all the then colonies of England that could choose either to adopt the 1911 Act as is--which is, for instance, what Australia did in 1912--or to implement their own copyright act that was nevertheless to be in line with the Imperial Act. This process coincided also with the slow coming-of-age of the colonies of the British Empire. The Canadian Parliament decided to adopt its own statute, and did so in 1921. (2) The time between the English law and Canada's decision to adopt its own statute is partly due to the First World War. But the Canadian legislation is a rephrasing to a certain extent of the 1911 British Act. Therefore, this 1921 Act--which is still today, in a certain way, the basis of our current Copyright Act (3)--reflected 1921, if not 1911 technology. After the Second World War, many countries started to revise their copyright legislation. The process that started in the 1950s in Canada led to a great number of reports about what should be done to modernize the Copyright Act, studies upon studies with no real action taking place. …