Liberals accuse Poilievre of planning to override charter rights with notwithstanding clause

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is accusing Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre of seeking to override constitutional rights following comments he made to the Canadian Police Association on Monday.

“Poilievre just proposed to override the fundamental freedoms and protections of Canadians, override the charter that is there to protect women, minorities, 2SLGBTQI+ communities,” Trudeau told reporters on his way into question period on Tuesday.

“That’s not right and it’s not responsible.”

During his speech to the police association, Poilievre promised to implement more stringent requirements for bail and make it harder for convicted murderers to transfer out of maximum security prisons.

The Tory leader hinted that he would use the notwithstanding clause to protect his proposed justice reforms from judicial review.

“We will make them constitutional, using whatever tools the Constitution allows me to use to make them constitutional. I think you know exactly what I mean,” Poilievre said Monday.

When asked by reporters to clarify his comments on Tuesday, Poilievre repeated his suggestion that his proposals will be “fully constitutional.”

“I will decide in my platform … my platform will be clear,” he said.

WATCH | Poilievre is asked how often he would use the notwithstanding clause:

Poilievre is asked how often he would use the notwithstanding clause

Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre, who on Monday said he would use ‘whatever tools the Constitution allows’ to pass criminal laws, faced questions Tuesday about his view of the courts and how often he would use the notwithstanding clause if he were prime minister.

In 2022, Poilievre said he would use the notwithstanding clause to reinstate a law that gave judges discretion to hand out consecutive, 25-year blocks of parole ineligibility to offenders who commit multiple first-degree murders.

The Supreme Court ruled that law was unconstitutional in the case of Alexandre Bissonette, who killed six people in a Quebec City mosque in 2017. 

The notwithstanding clause, or Section 33 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, gives parliaments in Canada the power to override certain portions of the charter for five-year terms when passing legislation.

Once invoked, Section 33 prevents any judicial review of the legislation in question.

“[Poilievre has] laid bare his intention to address his view of criminal law by tramping on charter rights,” Justice Minister Arif Virani said of Poilievre’s comments.

“I also think Canadians should be analyzing this for what it is and asking what other rights would he purport to override.”

Section 33 has never been used at the federal level but has been used a number of times provincially, most often in Quebec.

Bloc Québécois Leader Yves-François Blanchet told reporters Tuesday that the suggestion that a federal leader would use the notwithstanding clause proves it’s legitimate for provinces to invoke.

“The fact that a federal leader would want to use this notwithstanding clause makes it clear that it’s absolutely legit for Quebec or any province to do the same,” Blanchet said.

NDP House Leader Peter Julian called Poilievre’s comments “profoundly disturbing.”

“[Poilievre] seems willing to delete our rights,” he said outside the House of Commons Tuesday.

Julian pointed to a number of laws that were passed by the Stephen Harper Conservative government that have since been struck down by the courts. 

“The Harper government … repeatedly botched legislation in the House of Commons, did not pay attention to our rights and liberties,” Julian said. “Conservatives should have taken a lesson from that.”

WATCH | Poilievre using notwithstanding clause would be ‘traumatic’: constitutional lawyer 

Poilievre using notwithstanding clause would be ‘traumatic’: constitutional lawyer

Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre has hinted he’d use the notwithstanding clause to pass criminal laws if his party forms the next government. Constitutional lawyer Sujit Choudhry and former president of the Criminal Lawyers’ Association Daniel Brown both joined Power & Politics to discuss the implications.

Asked about Poilievre’s comments, Green Party Leader Elizabeth May accused Poilievre of “sloganeering untethered from principle.”

“I’m deeply disturbed that Mr. Poilievre would think it’s acceptable to suggest the federal government would use the notwithstanding clause to bulldoze through not just our Charter of Rights and Freedoms, but centuries of adherence to the principle that anyone in our criminal justice system is innocent until proven guilty,” she told an unrelated news conference on Tuesday.

“He wants to take a wrecking ball to the foundational principles of our civilization.”