Kerri Anne Froc – The Conversation

New Brunswick Premier Blaine Higgs delivers the State of the Province speech in Fredericton, N.B. in January 2024. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Stephen MacGillivray

April 21, 2024

New Brunswick’s notwithstanding clause use could spur Supreme Court action

Kerri Anne Froc, University of New Brunswick

New Brunswick’s proposed Compassion Intervention Act could motivate the Supreme Court of Canada to impose restrictions on the notwithstanding clause.

Ontario Premier Doug Ford speaks during a news conference, as Education Minister Stephen Lecce looks on in Toronto on Nov. 7, 2022. Ontario has repealed legislation that imposed a contract on 55,000 education workers and invoked the notwithstanding clause. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Nathan Denette

November 14, 2022

Preventing use of the notwithstanding clause is a bad idea — and unnecessary

Kerri Anne Froc, University of New Brunswick and Carissima Mathen, L’Université d’Ottawa/University of Ottawa

A Supreme Court reference on the notwithstanding clause could look beyond the highly polarized reactions to any particular law and get at the heart of the issue.

Minister of Justice David Lametti participates in an Ottawa news conference in June 2022 on proposed amendments to the Criminal Code in response to a Supreme Court of Canada decision involving a defence of extreme intoxication. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Justin Tang

October 18, 2022

What Parliament refused to hear about Canada’s new extreme intoxication law

Kerri Anne Froc, University of New Brunswick

More than a dozen women’s organizations pleaded with the federal government to slow down and treat their concerns seriously about Bill C-28. It didn’t listen.

Lapel pins are seen as part of a campaign in opposition to Québec’s Bill 21 during a news conference in Montréal in September 2019. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Paul Chiasson

August 23, 2022

How Québec’s Bill 21 could be vanquished by a rarely used Charter provision

Kerri Anne Froc, University of New Brunswick

The Québec government thought it would Charter-proof its religious symbol law when it invoked the nothwithstanding clause. It was wrong.

Ontario Premier Doug Ford walks to his office in June 2020 as legislators debated the government’s legislation that enabled it to invoke the notwithstanding clause. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Chris Young

July 26, 2021

Notwithstanding the notwithstanding clause, the Charter is everyone’s business

Jason MacLean, University of New Brunswick and Kerri Anne Froc, University of New Brunswick

By paying greater attention to the originally intended application of the Canadian Constitution’s notwithstanding clause, along with the diversity of lawmakers in Canada, there’s a better path forward.

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