EDMONTON — Now that Ontario Premier Doug Ford has announced he will use the notwithstanding clause to override a court decision so his government can downsize Toronto city council, the question for many political observers becomes: who’s going to use it next? The notwithstanding clause, a “classic Canadian compromise,” in the words of Alberta political scientist Ted Morton, was baked into the Canadian constitution to balance — and get the best of — an American-style setup of judicial superiority and a British-style system of parliamentary supremacy. “It was one of the compromises, or changes, that (Pierre) Trudeau made at the end of the negotiations to get the Western premiers, Western provinces on-side,” said Morton. This limits, at least in the present context of province-versus-Ottawa fights, the utility of the notwithstanding clause. “With respect to whether or not a province should use the notwithstanding clause on any specific issue, I’m not going to judge on that,” Premier Scott Moe said Wednesday.

Source: National Post September 12, 2018 22:16 UTC