Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, amendments to the Territorial Court Act and the Justices of the Peace Act.
Mr. Chairman, this bill is required because of a September 18, 1997, ruling of the Supreme Court of Canada in an appeal from judgements in PEI, Manitoba and Alberta. That case concerned the question whether the judicial independence of judges was breached when governments cut back the salaries and benefits of judges as part of the fiscal restraint measures of recent years. The Supreme Court ruled that a commission must be interposed between the judiciary and the Executive or legislature to report on a regular basis on the adequacy of judicial compensation and to report on proposed changes or freezes to judicial compensation. While judicial salaries can be cut back pursuant to general restraint measures, these must first be reviewed by the Judicial Compensation Review Commission.
The Supreme Court suspended its judgment for one year to provide time for jurisdictions to establish judicial compensation commissions.
Commissions must be independent, effective and objective. Based on the reasoning of the Supreme Court and the proposed course of action in other jurisdictions, the bill provides that the commission will be composed of three members, none of whom may be judges, sitting MLAs, public servants or lawyers. One member will be chosen by the judges, one by the government and these two members will select the third, who will be the chairperson.
The mandate of the commission will be to review proposals to change or freeze salaries and other benefits, and to review judicial renumeration every three years in light of inflation and other factors. The commission will initially review the compensation package, previously negotiated between the judges and the government, including the cutbacks to judges' salaries.
The Charter of Rights and Freedoms and the Constitution does not require that decisions of the commission be binding. However, the draft bill does provide for binding decisions on the basis that the experience of jurisdictions with commissions making binding recommendations is that commissions constituted with responsible members will make responsible decisions. As Minister of Justice and Attorney General, I prefer this to the alternative of non-binding recommendations, which would require the government to give reasons if it rejected a recommendation. These reasons could be reviewed by the courts to determine if they were defensibly rational. Non-binding recommendations risks the spectacle of judges taking the government to court and courts overturning decisions of the government.
Also included in this bill are minor amendments to the Territorial Court Act and the Justices of the Peace Act, to remove a potential barrier to the capacity of Justices of the Peace to exercise jurisdiction under the Young Offenders Act. It was the intention of a previous Legislative Assembly to give this jurisdiction to Justices of the Peace but additional changes are required to make it happen.
Mr. Chairman, I, and my officials, will be happy to answer any questions that the Members of the committee might have.