That good looking man you see above is David Eby, member of the British Columbia legislature representing the riding of Vancouver Point Grey, the province’s Attorney General and Minister of Justice, otherwise known as the man for whom sleep is a foreign concept, and the hardest working member of the British Columbia New Democratic Party government.
Kasari Govender, West Coast LEAF (Women’s Legal Education and Action Fund)
At present, West Coast LEAF (Women’s Legal Education and Action Fund) Executive Director Kasari Govender is acting as co-counsel on a suit filed against Mr. Eby, as B.C.’s Attorney General, on behalf of the Single Mothers’ Alliance BC. Ms. Govender is currently arguing in the British Columbia Supreme Court that B.C.’s legal aid scheme violates the Canadian Constitution by failing to provide adequate support for vulnerable women and their children fleeing violent relationships.
Meanwhile, the Trial Lawyers Association of British Columbia argues that “years of underfunding and shifting political priorities have taken their toll on the range and quality of legal aid services, and especially on the people who need them. One of the fundamental problems is that legal aid has been starved for funding for many years by successive governments, and there’s been a lot of political interference in legal aid over the years.”
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Try to imagine, if you will, what it must be like for David Eby, father, husband, feminist, and outstanding person of principal and integrity to be sued by one of his valued and cherished constituents (Ms. Govender), and the oversight body of which he has long been a member. Imagine how many conversations Mr. Eby has had with the Premier, members of his caucus, members of the Cabinet, the lobbyists in Victoria working on behalf of both of the above mentioned advocacy organizations, staff in his Victoria office, his constituents, women’s advocacy organizations, and a myriad of other advocacy organizations, as he works to develop a plan to once again return proper funding to legal aid in the province of British Columbia.
And try to imagine, as well, David Eby running to the press to decry “interference” by Premier John Horgan or his Chief of Staff, Geoff Meggs, or Finance Minister Carole James, or even B.C. Liberal party leader Andrew Wilkinson, for encroaching on the autonomy of the office of the Attorney General by dint of simply speaking to him on a matter, when all each sought to do was bring a new and perhaps compelling perspective to an issue before the Attorney General for consideration, with a chuffed Mr. Eby subsequently painting himself in a 2000-word published screed on his BC NDP MLA website, calling out his colleagues in the BC NDP as miscreants, he as the only principled elected official in the BC New Democratic Party provincial government, on the side of God and all that is right and proper.
Perhaps you don’t know David Eby, but we’re here to tell you that the above untoward scenario would never unfold. Mr. Eby simply has too much integrity and grit to ever allow such a discordant circumstance to occur.
From everything Canadians have read this past three months, and according to the woman herself, former federal Attorney General Jody Wilson-Raybould would consider the ‘par for the course’ interactions David Eby takes for granted daily as part of the business of being the province’s Attorney General, as interference with her autonomy.
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As we pointed out in yesterday’s column, when Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and members of the PMO proposed that Ms. Wilson-Raybould meet with the most distinguished lawyer in Canada, the former chief justice of the Supreme Court of Canada, the Honourable Beverley McLachlin, she refused. “Interference” with her autonomy, don’thca know.
Clayton Ruby, civil rights advocate, and one of Canada’s most well-respected lawyers
Clayton C. Ruby is one of Canada’s leading lawyers, an outspoken proponent of freedom of the press, and a prominent member of the environmental community, who specializes in criminal, constitutional, administrative and civil rights law, who has devoted his professional career to ensuring that those who are underprivileged and those who face discrimination are given equal access to the legal system of this country, in an April 12th article in The Star, wrote …
I think I know what advice she (Wilson-Raybould) might have gotten from McLachlin. And that explains why she didn’t want, and never accepted, that offer of legal advice.
She would have been told that over the last number of years the courts of Canada, including the Supreme Court of Canada, have pretty consistently been striking down mandatory minimum penalties in criminal sentencing because they give a judge no choice about the sentence. The law under which anyone is punished must allow sufficient discretion by the trial judge to give justice to offenders.
The law that would apply to SNC-Lavalin if they were convicted provides … no discretion to lower the 10-year prohibition on bidding for government contracts in Canada …
Mr. Ruby goes on to argue that the penalty of a 10-year ban “would be cruel and unusual and a violation of section 12 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, and be deemed to be disproportionate.”
Yet, then Attorney General Jody Wilson-Raybould demanded her ‘autonomy’ be respected, refused to consult, asked no one any questions on the state and impact of the law concerning mandatory minimum sentencing, refused to listen to outside advice, and set about to make her decision to proceed with a prosecution of SNC Lavalin as a “matter of principle” — when in fact there was little or no chance that SNC Lavalin would be convicted, or that the case would even make it to court — which is to say, the matter would be settled out of court, with severe and proper penalty for SNC Lavalin.
Arising from Wilson-Raybould’s intransigence, our government is in crisis.
Brian Greenspan, well-respected criminal defence attorney, graduate of Osgoode Hall
In a well-reasoned article written by past president of the Criminal Lawyers’ Association and founding chair of the Canadian Council of Criminal Defence Lawyers, Brian Greenspan (pictured above), and published in the Globe and Mail on April 17th, Mr. Greenspan argues that Jody Wilson-Raybould did not understand her role as Attorney General and Minister of Justice …
In a free and democratic society, the prosecutorial function does not operate in a vacuum, in isolation and immune from debate, discussion and, indeed, persuasion. Isolation breeds tyranny. Access to justice requires those who administer justice to be accessible, to be open to advocacy on behalf of clients and causes. Advocacy in the adversarial process does not undermine independence. In fact, the public interest is best served by ensuring that the decision-maker has meaningfully examined the conflicting positions and has been exposed to a comprehensive review of all relevant considerations.
Mr. Greenspan goes on to argue …
An Attorney General can receive vigorous advocacy and remain objective — her objectivity can most assuredly withstand collegial conversations with government colleagues and bureaucrats, in which they share their views and opinions on the merits of a prosecution. Thoughtful reconsideration and sober second thoughts do not threaten the independence of the Attorney General, nor do they jeopardize the integrity of our justice system.
Ms. Wilson-Raybould has expressed the position that any intervention by the Attorney General with the decision of the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) would have been automatically suspect, and that it would risk calling into question prosecutorial independence and the rule of law. The DPP, in fact, fulfills her responsibility under and on behalf of the Attorney General, and the act which governs her authority empowers the Attorney General to assume carriage of a prosecution or to direct the director. The Attorney General’s power to superintend prosecutions is an important aspect of our system. The former Attorney General treated the DPP as essentially unreviewable. Politically accountable oversight in ensuring that the public interest is properly taken into account isn’t anathema to the rule of law. The Attorney General’s power to superintend prosecutions is an integral part of our justice system.
VanRamblings will allow Mr. Greenspan’s words to ring in your ears.
The above testimony concludes VanRamblings’ three-part series on how Jody Wilson-Raybould failed Canadians, threw our government into an unnecessary, untenable and divisive constitutional crisis, did not fulfill her mandate, and failed to properly administer Canada’s justice system.
VanRamblings will publish a wrap-up column on the series tomorrow, where we will ask as we did yesterday, “Is Jody Wilson-Raybould a quisling?”
For now, we’ll leave you with the following re-creation of a conversation between Prime Minister Justin Pierre James Trudeau, and JWR aka Puglaas …
