Howling at Harper.
Summary
Judicial appointment process - Canada
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Extract
Howling at Harper.
In November 2006, the federal Executive moved to amend the processes--one cannot properly say rules that govern--associated with the exercise of its judicial appointment power. The then-standing process was, subsequent tinkering aside, the process installed by the Mulroney government in 1988. Under that scheme, persons seeking appointment to provincial or territorial Superior Courts or to the Federal Court were--and still are--required to submit applications to the Federal Office of Judicial Affairs, which then directs the applications to the Judicial Advisory Committee (JAC) in place in the jurisdiction, provincial or territorial, from which the applicant submitted.
There are presently twelve JACs across the country. Until the recent initiative, each was composed of seven members appointed by the federal Minister of Justice for three-year terms using the following calculus: one member was nominated by the provincial or territorial law society and another by the provincial or territorial branch of the Canadian Bar Association; a Superior Court judge was nominated by the provincial Chief Justice or territorial Senior Judge; a person (generally a non-lawyer) was nominated by the provincial Attorney-General or territorial Minister of Justice; and two non-lawyers and a lawyer--together termed "members at large"--were nominated by the federal Minister of Justice. Then as now, JACs are forbidden to act on their own to search for applicants and to interview or otherwise communicate with applicants. Instead they remain confined to in camera discussions of applicant merit assessed in light of three factors: t...See the full content of this document
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