For many Canadians, this was a key milestone in our nation’s constitutional history if only because it gave them a unique opportunity to bash Prime Minister Stephen Harper.
Why bash Harper over the Charter’s anniversary?
Well on the surface at least, Harper’s critics attacked him because his government allegedly didn’t do enough to commemorate the anniversary.
And indeed, there were no “Charter Day” parades, no 21-gun salutes, no ice sculptures of Pierre Trudeau signing the Constitution Act.
In fact, all the Harper government did was issue a bland news release, which made absolutely no mention of Trudeau’s greatness.
Former prime minister Jean Chrétien called this disappointing while Liberal MP Irwin Cotler called it “myopic.”
But much of the criticism against Harper on this issue went much deeper. Certain politicians and media types, for instance, suggested that Harper actually downplayed the anniversary for one basic and sinister reason: he doesn’t really believe in idea of a Charter.
As The Toronto Star put it in an editorial, “It’s a shame, then, that Prime Minister Stephen Harper and his Conservatives have no great regard for the Charter.”
Meanwhile, Liberal MP Justin Trudeau claimed Harper’s supposed disregard for the Charter was ideological in nature, exclaiming, “It shows that we have a government that can’t get beyond its partisan ideology … the Conservatives are supposed to be about protecting individuals from an intrusive state, so you would think they’d like the Charter.”
Nor is this the first time such attacks have been made against the Prime Minister. Back in 2007, on the Charter’s 25th anniversary, an article in The Lawyer’s Weekly called Harper a “Charter skeptic.”
But is Harper really a Charter skeptic? Does he oppose entrenching rights in our constitution?
The evidence of Harper’s past certainly suggests otherwise.
Just look up his history and you will find that far from disliking the Charter, the Prime Minister enthusiastically embraced it to promote the cause of individual liberty.
I am talking especially about his days at the conservative advocacy organization, the National Citizens Coalition, which Harper headed from 1998 to 2001. During his term at the NCC, Harper used the Charter time and time again to challenge what he considered to be bad laws.
For instance, in 2000 he went to court to battle the “election gag law”—a law which imposed severe legal restrictions on what Canadians could spend on political ads—because he believed it violated the Charter-guaranteed right to free speech.
What’s more, Harper wanted to turn the NCC into an organization that routinely used the courts to advance a freedom agenda. I know this because I worked alongside him at the time.
And by the way, Harper’s pro-Charter stance was not popular with all NCC supporters. Many of them still held old school conservative notions about the supremacy of parliament or were suspicious of “judicial activism.”
Indeed, back in the early 1980s the NCC actually opposed a written Charter of rights for these very reasons.
Yet Harper persisted, arguing the Charter and the courts were important tools to ensure the checks and balances of limited government.
Hardly sounds like a guy who is a Charter skeptic or who has no regard for entrenched constitutional rights, does it?
Now, of course, Harper has changed a lot since his NCC stint. He’s certainly less ideological and more pragmatic.
But aside from holding no anniversary ceremony, there is scant evidence to suggest Harper now opposes the Charter.
This is a fact his critics should keep in mind.
Original Article
Source: hill times
Author: GERRY NICHOLLS
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