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A judge's failure to advise an accused of their language rights is an error of law warranting a new trial unless the Crown rebuts the presumption of prejudice.
The appellant, a bilingual Francophone, was convicted of sexual assault following a trial conducted in English.
The justice of the peace before whom he first appeared failed to advise him of his right under s. 530(3) of the Criminal Code to be tried in the official language of his choice.
The appellant raised this breach for the first time on appeal.
The majority held that a breach of s. 530(3) constitutes an error of law under s. 686(1)(a)(ii) of the Criminal Code, giving rise to a presumption that the accused's fundamental right to be tried in the official language of his choice was violated.
The Crown bore the burden of rebutting this presumption under the curative proviso in s. 686(1)(b)(iv), and failed to do so on the evidence.
The appeal was allowed, the conviction quashed, and a new trial in French ordered.
Karakatsanis and Martin JJ. dissented, concluding the breach was a miscarriage of justice under s. 686(1)(a)(iii) requiring the appellant to demonstrate actual deprivation of knowledge of his language rights, a burden he did not meet.
The Minister must proportionately balance section 23 Charter values when exercising discretion over minority-language school admissions.
Five non-rights holder parents applied to the Minister to exercise discretion to admit their children to a French first language education program in the Northwest Territories, with the support of the francophone school board.
The Minister denied each application, finding the parents did not meet the categories established in the ministerial directive.
The SCC held that the Minister was required not only to consider s. 23 of the Charter but to conduct a proportionate balancing of the values underlying that provision — including preservation and development of the minority language community — against the government's interests.
Applying the Doré framework, the Court found the decisions unreasonable because the Minister gave disproportionate weight to consistency and cost, and insufficient weight to pedagogical requirements and the remedial purpose of s. 23.
The appeal was allowed and the Court of Appeal orders set aside.
Palmer test governs all additional evidence on appeal; trial judge's relocation order is restored.
The appellant mother was awarded primary residence of the children at trial and permitted to relocate approximately ten hours from the respondent father's residence.
The father successfully appealed to the British Columbia Court of Appeal, which admitted post-trial financial evidence under a test distinct from Palmer and used it to overturn the relocation order.
The Supreme Court of Canada allowed the appeal, holding that the Palmer test governs all additional evidence tendered on appeal for the purpose of reviewing the decision below, whether the evidence relates to events before or after trial.
The new evidence failed the Palmer due diligence criterion because it could have been available at trial with reasonable diligence, and its admission was not in the interests of justice given the availability of legislative variation procedures.
The trial judge's relocation analysis under Gordon v. Goertz was free from reviewable error, and the Court of Appeal wrongly intervened in the absence of a palpable and overriding error.
Provincial offence accused holds the right to trial in French via Criminal Code incorporation.
The appellant was charged with a provincial driving offence in British Columbia and applied to be tried in French pursuant to s. 530 of the Criminal Code.
The provincial court dismissed the application, holding that the 1731 Act mandated English-only proceedings.
The Supreme Court of Canada held that s. 133 of the Offence Act incorporates s. 530 of the Criminal Code, granting the right to be tried in either official language in provincial offence proceedings.
The Court further held that the provincial court's refusal to honour this right constituted a jurisdictional error amenable to immediate certiorari review, and that an appeal following conviction was not an adequate alternative remedy given the fundamental and personal nature of the language right violated.
