Law in Quebec

News about Quebec legal developments

Quebec

  • French Language Charter draft regulations provides more clarity but questions remain

    An eagerly awaited draft regulation intended to yield guidance on amendments introduced by Bill 96 to the Charter of the French Language sheds light on certain areas but raises additional questions, is more restrictive, has more onerous requirements and risks alienating some sectors of the business world, according to legal pundits.

    The draft Regulation to amend mainly the Regulation respecting the language of commerce and business, released nearly 18 months after Bill 96 amendments to the French Charter received royal assent, mainly deals with the public display of trademarks and French language labelling of products, but also touches on adhesion contracts and commercial documents.

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  • Crown prosecutors taking Quebec government to court in wage dispute

    Days after Quebec’s adjudicators issued an ultimatum due to a lack of “concrete proposals” over their demands for major pay hikes, Quebec Crown prosecutors, “dismayed and insulted” by the Quebec government’s “bad faith” during negotiations, filed a motion before Quebec Superior Court to invalidate a government decision that affects their working conditions, the latest labour conflict to surface between the Quebec government and leading legal actors.

    The application for judicial review and motion, the second legal challenge the Quebec Association of Public Prosecutors for Criminal and Penal Prosecutions has mounted over the past three months, was launched after the Quebec government unilaterally rejected or modified recommendations made by an arbitrator appointed by both parties over normative conditions, including workload, family leave and remote working, said Guillaume Michaud, the organization’s president.

    “The aim of this appeal is to get the government to follow the recommendations of an independently appointed arbitrator,” explained Michaud. “If it doesn’t, we end up with a useless mechanism. This means that on day one when I sit down with the government to negotiate, I know that in the end it can decide what it wants. It makes no sense for the other side to have a say at the end and then decide what it wants.”

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  • Quebec Judicial Council and provincial government still at odds

    The Quebec Judicial Council and the Quebec Justice Minister still do not see eye-to-eye.

    A month ago Justice Minister Simon Jolin-Barrette and Henri Richard, the new Chief Judge of the Court of Quebec reached an agreement over bilingualism requirements for new judicial appointments that seemingly put an end to an appeal for judicial review before Quebec Superior Court. The review seeks to declare unconstitutional and invalid certain legislative and regulatory provisions adopted in 2022 over selection criteria for candidates for the position of judge of the Court of Québec or of a municipal court.

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  • Strip search not discriminatory, rules Quebec Appeal Court

    A Quebec Human Rights Tribunal that found that a prisoner had been discriminated against during a strip search because he had been viewed by a correctional services officer of the opposite sex was overturned by the Quebec Court of Appeal after it concluded that there was no evidence that the prisoner’s sex played any role in the differential treatment to which he was subjected.

    The Tribunal found that the plaintiff suffered discriminatory treatment with respect to the rights enshrined in ss. 4 (but not 5), 24.1, 25 and 26 of the Québec Charter of Human Rights and Freedoms. It ordered the appellants solidarily to pay the plaintiff $6,000 for moral damages, and ordered a prison guard to pay $1,000 in punitive damages.

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  • Human rights lawyers hail Quebec tribunal’s finding that pension provision is discriminatory

    A legislative provision in the Act respecting the Quebec Pension Plan that financially penalizes disability claimants at age 65 was declared unconstitutional because it infringed the right to equality under the Canadian Charter, held the Administrative Tribunal of Quebec in a decision lauded by human rights advocates who say the ruling may ultimately affect thousands of people.

    The long-awaited judgment demonstrates an openness by adjudicators to recognize economic and social rights, and is a clear signal that guidance from the Supreme Court of Canada, particularly in a series of 2020 decisions in Fraser v. Canada (Attorney General), 2020 SCC 28 and Ontario (Attorney General) v. G, 2020 SCC 38, over the notion of substantive equality as opposed to formal equality is making inroads in lower courts and administrative tribunals, according to human law experts. In Fraser, the Supreme Court underscores that substantive equality underpins the court’s equality jurisprudence, and is at its heart the recognition that identical treatment may frequently produce serious inequality.

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  • Montreal lawyer disqualified as representative counsel in proposed cryptocurrency class action

    In a case that deals with the bounds of “entrepreneurial lawyering” and whether it exceeds the “proper limits of ethical rules,” Quebec Superior Court disqualified a Montreal lawyer as the representative’s counsel in a proposed class action suit seeking compensatory and punitive damages for individuals who bought or sold cryptocurrencies from Shakepay inc.

    The proposed class action in essence alleges that Shakepay charged hidden commissions, contravening the Consumer Protection Act, Civil Code of Quebec, and the Competition Act.

    Justice Lukasz Granosik said that disqualifying a lawyer requires a “great deal of circumspection.” But a combination of “minor transgressions” occurred in this case crossed the line, held Justice Granosik in Abicidan c. Shakepay inc., 2024 QCCS 11.

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  • Quebec municipal court reforms draw mixed reactions from legal community

    A comprehensive legislative reform of the municipal court system recently introduced by the Quebec government has drawn mixed reactions, with the legal community applauding the initiative but equally concerned that it may undermine judicial and institutional independence of municipal courts.

    Bill 40, the most significant remodelling of municipal courts in more than two decades, establishes to the surprise of legal observers a management structure for municipal courts that is entirely independent of the Court of Québec; eliminates part-time municipal court judges; and places all municipal judges on an equal footing, allowing them to earn the same salary as current municipal judges who practise on an exclusive basis.

    But to the consternation of legal actors, from judges to the Quebec bar, Bill 40 also grants the government, after consultation with the chief municipal judge, the power to designate a co-ordinating judge and determine the term of office. The bill also provides that co-ordinating judges and the chief municipal judge must send a report on their activities at least twice a year to the Quebec justice minister, and it requires the chief municipal judge to “meet the performance targets of municipal courts and consider the needs of municipalities and litigants.”

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  • French-language law faculties grappling with new breed of generative AI tools

    A year after the emergence of a new breed of generative artificial intelligence tools were thrust into public consciousness, with the program ChatGPT leading the charge, French-language law faculties in Quebec, Ontario and New Brunswick are still grappling over its far-reaching potential impacts on teaching and learning in higher education.

    The widespread availability of free and low-cost AI chatbots capable of generating sophisticated, human-like responses culled from heaps of data from open-web content has stirred debate and prompted deliberation within French-language law faculties over a host of issues, ranging from academic integrity or cheating, cognitive bias, privacy and security concerns, intellectual property rights, and the benefits and risks of implementing AI tools in teaching and learning.

    Some law faculties, while they have not closed the door on implementing their own internal policies, have however opted to wait for their institution to forge an establishment-wide AI policy. Others such as the Université du Québec à Montréal see no need for a university-wide policy or formal departmental guidelines governing the use of AI, other than the stipulation that students respect academic integrity regulations.

    “It’s clear that things are changing fast, which is why we need to work well,” said David Robitaille, vice-dean of studies at the Faculty of Law – Civil Law at the University of Ottawa. “It’s certainly a priority issue for faculties, at least for ours. But we shouldn’t rush into solutions too quickly.”

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  • Decision may spur authorities to hold organizations accountable for workplace deaths

    An appeal by a Quebec City company that was found guilty of criminal negligence causing the death of one of its workers was dismissed by the Quebec Court of Appeal in a “very important” decision that may spur law enforcement officials and Crown prosecutors across the country to be more aggressive and hold to account organizations and decision-makers for workplace deaths, according to legal experts.

    In one of the few appellate court decisions in the country that has examined the criminal liability of organizations, the Quebec Appeal Court clarified the use and scope of the so-called Westray bill or Bill C-45, particularly section 217.1 of the Criminal Code, held that any evidence, including circumstantial evidence, during the period preceding the indictment is admissible, and that victim’s statements reported by witnesses is allowed so long as it is used for narrative rather than adjudicative purposes, noted legal pundits.

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  • Far-reaching decision addresses racial profiling in prisons

    The Quebec Human Rights Tribunal ordered the Attorney General of Quebec and eight prison employees to pay a young black man $41,500 in moral and punitive damages in a decision deemed to be a major step forward in the recognition of racial profiling and the duty to accommodate in prisons, according to legal observers.

    The ruling, the first to deal with racial profiling in a Quebec detention center, also issued public interest orders under Article 80 of the Quebec Charter of Human Rights and Freedoms, compelling the provincial Ministry of Public Safety to develop and implement a strategic plan for discriminatory profiling and disseminate the plan to all correctional officers.

    “Given the documented overrepresentation of black people in prisons, it is disturbing that prison staff are not more aware of the phenomenon of racial profiling and the prejudices and stereotypes that affect those who are subject to it,” said the Tribunal in Commission des droits de la personne et des droits de la jeunesse (Toussaint) c. Procureur général du Québec (Ministère de la Sécurité publique), 2023 QCTDP 21.

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  • Quebec ruling ‘important step forward’ for labour rights

    Quebec’s provincial police officers, dissatisfied with the progress of labour negotiations, will begin donning colourful cargo pants, a tactic that was given the green light by a ruling that recognizes the right to modify uniforms as an “associational activity” that could be protected by the Canadian Charter.

    “We have no choice but to resort to a means of visibility that conveys a message of dissatisfaction,” said Jacques Painchaud, president of the Quebec Provincial Police Association (APPQ), in a press release.

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  • Crypto-asset exchange platforms under the spotlight

    The Quebec financial watchdog is clamping down on foreign crypto-asset trading platforms.

    Barely two months after a Dubai-based crypto-asset trading platform operating without a licence in Quebec was fined $2 million and ordered to cease trading in the province, the Financial Markets Administrative Tribunal (Tribunal) sanctioned the operators behind Hong Kong-based Coinex.com and its entities.

    The Tribunal imposed an an administrative penalty of $2 million on Coinex and its entities, on a joint and several basis, and an administrative penalty of $300,000 against  its founder Haipo Yang.  CoinEx Global Limited, founded in 2017, also trades as CoinEx and CoinEx.com, CoinEx Global Limited (CoinEx Canada), CoinEx Global Limited (CoinEx Estonia) and Vino Global Limited (Vino Global). The Tribunal also ordered the CoinEx entities, Vino Global Limited, and Haipo Yang to permanently block access to the site within two months following the ruling.

    The decisions by the administrative tribunal reaffirms the resolve by securities watchdogs to protect investors from non-compliant crypto-asset trading platforms firms, according to legal experts.

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  • Easing of Quebec language law may be helpful for business, but questions remain: legal experts

    New regulations aimed at blunting some of the more onerous stipulations of Bill 96, Quebec’s French language law, help take into account practical realities faced by business and organizations but are not the panacea some may think, legal experts warn.

    The regulations, one aimed at Quebec’s civil administration and the other targeting the research world, clarify provisions of the Quebec Charter of the French Language (Charter) and temper the blanket requirement to use French, allowing under limited circumstances the use of languages other than French in communications, contracts and documents.

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  • Quebec revises law on medical assistance in dying, but questions remain

    Quebec has adopted a law that broadens access to medical assistance in dying (MAiD) and allows for advance requests for doctor-assisted death, but health law experts warn that clear direction will be needed to help clinicians, patients and the public navigate existing disparities between the federal and provincial regime.

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  • Impact of lengthy imprisonment on offender family’s is a mitigating factor

    In a case that provided the Quebec Court of Appeal with an “opportunity to address the extent to which the detrimental impact of a lengthy term of imprisonment on the offender’s family can operate as a mitigating factor in the sentencing process,” the appellate court dismissed an appeal by the Crown over a sentence handed to a man found guilty of two counts of sexual interference on his 12-year old daughter and her friend.

    Keen on dispelling the Crown’s contention that the sentence of 90 days’ imprisonment sentence to be served intermittently was lenient and demonstrably unfit, the Appeal Court reiterated that sentencing ranges are only guidelines, reaffirmed that the objectives of denunciation and deterrence should be given relative precedence, and underlined that the detrimental impact of a lengthy term of imprisonment on the offender’s family can be considered as a mitigating factorin exceptional cases, affirm legal experts.

    “It’s an excellent decision,” remarked Hugues Parent, a criminal law professor at the Université de Montréal and author of “Treatise on Criminal Law” which is cited in the decision. “Taking into account the impact of a person’s incarceration on the family can only be done when the sentence respects the principles of proportionality. It is certainly not a predominant factor in all cases, that’s for sure. It is only considered in exceptional cases where the person has a favourable profile.”

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Law in Quebec
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