Good evening. On behalf of the Criminal Lawyers' Association, I thank you for inviting our organization to give you our thoughts on this very important topic. Having seen the transcript of the remarks of previous witnesses, I truly feel honoured to be a member of this group of individuals and part of this debate.
The Criminal Lawyers' Association represents more than 1,500 members, primarily criminal defence lawyers in the province of Ontario. A large portion of our efforts relates to ensuring access to justice in criminal law and protecting the civil liberties of Canadians.
The majority of our members' clients are part of vulnerable groups in one way or another. Our organization's members routinely assist individuals with mental health issues, marginalized groups, the impoverished, and the uneducated. Our position here really reflects what is the constitutionally minimal standard that's set out in Carter, and what the role is of Parliament and the federal sphere in how to deal with the issue of section 7 compliance.
The Criminal Lawyers' Association is against the duplication or the addition of unnecessary complications into an already unwieldy Criminal Code. We're skeptical of any attempt to import what is essentially a medical regulation into the Criminal Code. We're also skeptical about the federal government's jurisdictional competence to regulate assisted suicide comprehensively within the Criminal Code. The Criminal Code, as we know, is a very blunt tool, and it ought to be used sparingly. You have to ask yourself if the federal role will be a criminal one, because that's the anchor for the jurisdictional authority. What does that look like?
What is the continued relevance of criminal law and the regulation of physician-assisted death post-Carter? That is the question I'm here to address on behalf of the Criminal Lawyers' Association.
Having gone through some of the testimony in earlier hearings and having gone through Carter several times now, I must say that Carter sets out fairly clearly what is the constitutionally minimum standard. It starts at paragraph 1 of the decision. Paragraph 1 of the decision couldn't be more clear as to what the issue is with section 7 compliance.
The prohibition in the Criminal Code with respect to counselling suicide created a net that was cast too wide and went beyond the legislative objective. That's what section 7 principles of fundamental justice are about—looking at the legislative objective and then looking at the effects of trying to meet that legislative objective. Overbreadth is really about casting a net that's too wide.
What Carter was about and what the Supreme Court was saying is that there are individuals who unfortunately are faced with a “cruel” choice as a result of this blanket prohibition. Those were the words of the Supreme Court in paragraph 1 of Carter. A person who is able to consent and has a grievous and irremediable illness or medical condition and intolerable suffering faces this cruel choice of ending their life early, before the onset of this intolerable suffering or pain, or waiting for a natural death. The Supreme Court found this to be an unconstitutional choice that individuals were faced with.
If we're going to accept that this counselling suicide provision is going to remain in the Criminal Code—and for the purposes of these hearings, I take it as a given that we are leaving it in place—the role of the federal government in terms of a constitutionally minimal standard is to really create an exception that meets those constitutionally minimum standards. Outside of that, subject to the comments I made earlier, getting into comprehensive regulation would just be encroaching upon the powers of the provincial governments to regulate health care.
Subject to questions, of course, those are my comments at this time.