My colleague tells me it has been done. If anyone does not have a copy, I am prepared to provide one.
The bar associations of Quebec and Canada have spoken out against the federal government in connection with this bill. On April 30, 2003, the Trois-Rivières newspaper Le Nouvelliste ran an article reporting that “The Quebec and Canadian bar associations are opposed to a legislative amendment relating to the reimbursement of the GST for transportation services provided by Quebec and Ontario school boards”.
It went on to say:
The Barreau du Québec, and the Canadian Bar Association, have come out very strongly against Ottawa's intention to thumb its nose at a court decision and to legislate retroactively, somethingthey describe as a “dangerous attitude liable to undermine public confidence in the courts”.
The two associations have written the Minister of Finance... and the Minister of Justice to express their opposition to a legislative change outlined in the February budget.
This letter was sent on April 30, 2003. It goes on:
This measure, which involved the reimbursement of GST for transportation services provided by Quebec and Ontario school boards would have the effect of retroactively invalidating court decisions in favour of the school boards, not to mention reneging on certain previous commitments by the federal government.
With this attitude, the federal government “Is showing no respect whatsoever for these judgments and these commitments, which from our point of view represents a serious attack on the principle of the authority of a final judgment, and is contrary to the proper administration of justice. This is what the President of the Quebec bar association, Claude G. Leduc, wrote to the two ministers. Legislating in this way discredits the judiciary process and is liable to undermine the taxpayers' confidence in the courts”.
His Canadian Bar Association counterpart, Simon Potter, was equally critical. “We are convinced that the policy behind any retroactivity is totally unfounded and dangerous as well”, he wrote.
In October 2001, 29 Quebec school boards won their case in Federal Court, when it recognized that school transportation was a commercial activity and thus entitled them to full reimbursement of the GST paid. By virtue of the court decision, Ottawa was to reimburse GST overpayments totalling some $8 million.
After numerous technical wranglings, the case ended up before the Tax Court of Canada this past January. Here the federal government accepted a ruling that it would comply with the judgment at first instance, provided the school boards withdrew their appeal to the Federal Appeal Court. The federal government consented to apply the judgment to the Ontario school boards, whose case was still pending.
The budget presented a few weeks later totally altered this promise by the federal government . The amendment is currently being considered in committee, and school board representatives will present their points of view before the committee.
According to... the Bloc Quebecois MP, the government is going too far with this. We are entitled to expect the government to amend its legislation to reflect court judgments, in order to remedy shortcomings for the future. The retroactivity proposed by the federal government is problematic. “This may represent an extremely negative precedent... It will greatly weaken one of the pillars of democracy, which is the authority of a final judgment”, according to the Bloc Quebecois finance critic.
I wish to inform the House that I will be voting against the budget because of this clause concerning the school boards, clause 64 of Bill C-28.