The Charter of Rights and Freedoms, the 30th anniversary of which falls today, is changing Canada for the worse — its emphasis on individual rights may trump the broader public good and even open the door to Americanization of medicare, says one of its architects, Roy Romanow, the former NDP premier of Saskatchewan.
A new generation of “Charter kids” and “Charter judges” is advancing individual rights and diluting the “communitarian impulses” of Canadians, he said in a telephone interview from Saskatoon, where he teaches at the University of Saskatchewan.
Romanow played a pivotal role at the historic 1981 First Ministers’ Conference in Ottawa that paved the way to the signing of the Charter by the Queen on April 17, 1982.
As Saskatchewan’s attorney general at the time, he worked across party lines to help break a deadlock between then Prime Minister Pierre Elliot Trudeau and the premiers.
Joining him in brokering the Charter were Liberal Jean Chrétien, then-federal minister of justice, and Conservative Bill Davis, premier of Ontario, and his attorney general Roy McMurtry.
I spoke to all four for the landmark Charter anniversary.
Chrétien, Davis and McMurtry spoke glowingly about how the Charter has made Canada a more equitable society.
It certainly has, said Romanow. But it’s also opening the door to a more self-centred society.
“Before the Charter, we essentially looked for the resolution of federal-provincial disputes more from a provincial perspective, a regional perspective and a communitarian perspective.
“Now after 30 years we have empowered individuals and they have tried to enforce individual rights.
“We have a new generation of Canadians who don’t see Canada the way I saw it. My generation looked to over-arching Canadian values being predominant. And that meant that there were more opportunities of sharing, accommodating and compromise.
“When I teach today, I notice that these Charter kids think more individually. They have less of a historical connection to the notion of communitarian impulses. It’s almost like a different country now.
“They see Canada through an individual lens, whether it’s their gender rights or health rights. It’s worrisome because the answers are not always either/or.”
Romanow cited a 2005 Supreme Court decision rejecting Quebec’s prohibition against individuals buying private health insurance for publicly available health services.
A Montreal man waiting for a hip replacement had mounted a Charter challenge against the ban. The court’s ruling in his favour was seen as opening the door for private health case, thereby undermining medicare.
While medicare is a powerful national tool of collective Canadian action, Romanow said, “in its actual application, the impulses are all individualistic. This is the result of the culture of the Charter.
“This case is a cautionary tale that we may be weakening the ties and the fabric that bind this nation together and provide us with such programs as the Canada Pension Plan, the Quebec Pension Plan and national health care.
“In effect, the court was obligating the state on an elective procedure, regardless of the state’s ability. If you obligate the state to provide services at any cost, you inevitably end up going the privatization route.”
That leads to the American way. “Canadians see medicare as a social good. Americans see it as a commodity. That’s the sharp, sharp contrast between our societies.”
The lesson to be drawn, he said, is that governments must provide “social services in a timely and affordable fashion. If they don’t, the courts will get more and more into this game,” thereby redefining our social programs.
Original Article
Source: Star
Author: Haroon Siddiqui
A new generation of “Charter kids” and “Charter judges” is advancing individual rights and diluting the “communitarian impulses” of Canadians, he said in a telephone interview from Saskatoon, where he teaches at the University of Saskatchewan.
Romanow played a pivotal role at the historic 1981 First Ministers’ Conference in Ottawa that paved the way to the signing of the Charter by the Queen on April 17, 1982.
As Saskatchewan’s attorney general at the time, he worked across party lines to help break a deadlock between then Prime Minister Pierre Elliot Trudeau and the premiers.
Joining him in brokering the Charter were Liberal Jean Chrétien, then-federal minister of justice, and Conservative Bill Davis, premier of Ontario, and his attorney general Roy McMurtry.
I spoke to all four for the landmark Charter anniversary.
Chrétien, Davis and McMurtry spoke glowingly about how the Charter has made Canada a more equitable society.
It certainly has, said Romanow. But it’s also opening the door to a more self-centred society.
“Before the Charter, we essentially looked for the resolution of federal-provincial disputes more from a provincial perspective, a regional perspective and a communitarian perspective.
“Now after 30 years we have empowered individuals and they have tried to enforce individual rights.
“We have a new generation of Canadians who don’t see Canada the way I saw it. My generation looked to over-arching Canadian values being predominant. And that meant that there were more opportunities of sharing, accommodating and compromise.
“When I teach today, I notice that these Charter kids think more individually. They have less of a historical connection to the notion of communitarian impulses. It’s almost like a different country now.
“They see Canada through an individual lens, whether it’s their gender rights or health rights. It’s worrisome because the answers are not always either/or.”
Romanow cited a 2005 Supreme Court decision rejecting Quebec’s prohibition against individuals buying private health insurance for publicly available health services.
A Montreal man waiting for a hip replacement had mounted a Charter challenge against the ban. The court’s ruling in his favour was seen as opening the door for private health case, thereby undermining medicare.
While medicare is a powerful national tool of collective Canadian action, Romanow said, “in its actual application, the impulses are all individualistic. This is the result of the culture of the Charter.
“This case is a cautionary tale that we may be weakening the ties and the fabric that bind this nation together and provide us with such programs as the Canada Pension Plan, the Quebec Pension Plan and national health care.
“In effect, the court was obligating the state on an elective procedure, regardless of the state’s ability. If you obligate the state to provide services at any cost, you inevitably end up going the privatization route.”
That leads to the American way. “Canadians see medicare as a social good. Americans see it as a commodity. That’s the sharp, sharp contrast between our societies.”
The lesson to be drawn, he said, is that governments must provide “social services in a timely and affordable fashion. If they don’t, the courts will get more and more into this game,” thereby redefining our social programs.
Original Article
Source: Star
Author: Haroon Siddiqui
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