Kevin P. Feehan

The Province of Alberta introduced a new school funding scheme that pooled all revenues in a central fund and distributed them on a per-student basis.

Separate school boards, but not public school boards, were permitted to opt out of the scheme and continue raising funds directly from ratepayers.

The appellants challenged the scheme, arguing it violated a constitutional right to reasonable autonomy, discriminated against public school boards, and violated a principle of mirror equality.

The Supreme Court of Canada dismissed the appeal, holding that school boards do not have a constitutional right to reasonable autonomy, the funding scheme does not discriminate against public school boards as it meets a standard of fairness, and the constitutional provisions do not guarantee mirror equality between public and separate school boards.

The appellants brought a motion to introduce fresh evidence of legislative fact, including statistics, newspaper articles, and reports, in a constitutional appeal regarding school boards.

The Supreme Court of Canada dismissed the motion, holding that the traditional Palmer test for fresh evidence applies to legislative facts, albeit with less stringent admissibility requirements.

The Court found that the appellants failed to meet the due diligence requirement for much of the evidence, the newspaper articles were controversial opinions rather than legislative facts, and the reports were either untested or too tentative to affect the result.