The issue suggests Trudeau’s conflict with Wilson-Raybould may have gone beyond SNC-Lavalin
OTTAWA — Jody Wilson-Raybould recommended in 2017 that Prime Minister Justin Trudeau nominate a conservative Manitoba judge to be chief justice of the Supreme Court, even though he wasn’t a sitting member of the top court and had been a vocal critic of its activism on Charter of Rights issues, The Canadian Press has learned.
The issue suggests Trudeau may have had reasons unrelated to the SNC-Lavalin affair for moving Wilson-Raybould out of the prestigious Justice portfolio earlier this year — a cabinet shuffle that touched off a full-blown political crisis for the governing Liberals. Her retirement meant the government would have to choose a new chief justice and find another bilingual judge from western or northern Canada to sit on the nine-member bench.
Only once before in Canadian history — in 1906, when Sir Wilfrid Laurier appointed his justice minister to the top judicial job — has a prime minister chosen a chief justice who was not already sitting on the Supreme Court. In a January 2017 speech to the Canadian Constitution Foundation’s Law and Freedom Conference, Joyal echoed conservative arguments that the top court has usurped the supremacy of elected legislatures to determine social policy.
Canada Latest News, Canada Headlines
Similar News:You can also read news stories similar to this one that we have collected from other news sources.
Trudeau says he had ‘cordial’ conversation with Jody Wilson-Raybould about SNC-Lavalin, discussed ‘next steps’The PM signals that Wilson-Raybould and former Treasury Board president Jane Philpott will be allowed to remain in the Liberal caucus
Read more »
Trudeau says he had 'cordial' conversation with Jody Wilson-Raybould about SNC-LavalinThe PM signals that Wilson-Raybould and former Treasury Board president Jane Philpott will be allowed to remain in the Liberal caucus
Read more »
What Jody Wilson-Raybould and Jane Philpott can actually say — and where - Macleans.caPhilippe Lagassé: If they believe the constitution was undermined, parliamentary privilege offers them the freedom of speech to say so without fear of being prosecuted
Read more »
Senators challenged to prove their independence by inviting Jody Wilson-Raybould to testifyThe Liberal majority on the justice committee shut down a study of the SNC-Lavalin scandal and declined Wilson-Raybould’s offer to testify again
Read more »
Jody Wilson-Raybould plans to provide further evidence to House justice committee, letter says‘A request was made for ‘copies of text messages and emails’ that I referred to in my testimony … I will provide copies,’ the former attorney-general and justice minister wrote in a letter to the chair of the House of Commons justice committee
Read more »
Wilson-Raybould offers documents about SNC-Lavalin affair to justice committeeJody Wilson-Raybould plans to reveal more - in writing - about her accusation that she faced improper pressure to prevent the criminal prosecution of SNC-Lavalin.
Read more »
Opposition MPs call for open justice committee, Wilson-Raybould to reappearOpposition MPs want the Liberal dominated justice committee to recall former Attorney General Jody Wilson-Raybould.
Read more »
Relations between Trudeau, Wilson-Raybould began to fray over her Supreme Court pick: SourcesRelations between Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and then-Attorney General Jody Wilson-Raybould first began to fray in 2017 over concerns about her choice to fill a vacancy on the Supreme Court of Canada.
Read more »