So, that’s it. With this final post, my tornado-in-the-tribunal-justice-trailer-park account of the Ford administration’s destruction of the targeted tribunals’ rule-of-law credentials comes to a merciful end.
You will recall, from the first post in this series, that what I have referred to as the “targeted tribunals” included, most notably: the Human Rights Tribunal, the Landlord and Tenant Board, the Social Benefits Tribunal, the Health Professions Appeal and Review Board, the Health Services Appeal and Review Board, the Local Planning and Review Board, the Consent and Capacity Board, the Environmental Review Board, the Child and Family Review Board, the Public Service Grievance Settlement Board ….
This series of posts has shown how the Ford administration roared through this trailer park of adjudicative tribunals, desecrating their independence, their impartiality, their expertise, and their institutional competence. In the fields of human rights, landlord and tenants’ rights, disability benefits, delivery of health services, access to medical treatment, community-planning control, environmental protection, child protection, and public-service labour rights, the Ford administration has deliberately undone the rule of law; undone the rule of law through despoiling the rule-of-law credentials of the tribunals entrusted with the enforcement of those rights and benefits.
Where, I ask, is the general outcry? Have we heard from the Ontario Bar Association? From the Law Society? From the other political parties? From the editorial boards of the major newspapers? What does it say about a society in which a major political party could possibly think it was okay to do this?
And how can we fix it so that, the next time the rule of law can be seen to be flourishing in the tribunal justice system in the hands of expert, optimally competent, independent and impartial tribunals, it cannot be undone again by another government that sees respect for the rule of law in the enforcement of these rights and benefits incompatible with its own interests?
Stay tuned.
RE