TURMEL: Canada Supreme Court okays excluding candidates from TV debates
johnturmel
the CRTC decision to let Fuhrer Philp have the cops take me off
the debate was dismissed at the top not because he had good cause
(I showed my party badge) but because the media can exclude
anyone they wish.
Of course, the Supreme Court doesn't say why your application to
appeal got rejected, you have to guess. Or...
One can apply in special circumstances for a Reconsideration of
the case! I've done it before since most of the cases I deal with
are life-and-death cannabis-prohibition and usury-permission
issues but this is merely a fundamental question of democracy. So
it shouldn't be treated too importantly by this crew of judicial
incompetents.
So, they don't say why the application for leave is rejected. But
they do have to write a summary of the case!
If you go to my docket at
http://www.scc-csc.gc.ca/case-dossier/cms-sgd/dock-regi-eng.aspx?cas=33319
you'll see the side bar with links to Docket, Parties, Counsel,
Summary, Factums (mine isn't there), Webcasts for those who are
let in.
Now, the Supreme Court Judges aren't going to admit that they're
okaying candidate exclusion so I'll bet they're going to fudge up
the summary of what it was about! And their misunderstanding of
this major issue of democracy will be my ground for
reconsideration. Here goes:
http://www.scc-csc.gc.ca/case-dossier/cms-sgd/sum-som-eng.aspx?cas=33319
SCC Case Information
Summary
33319
John C. Turmel v. Canadian Radio-Television and
Telecommunications Commission
(Federal Court) (Civil) (By Leave)
Keywords
Administrative Law.
Summary
Case summaries are prepared by the Office of the Registrar of the
Supreme Court of Canada (Law Branch) for information purposes
only.
JCT: Of course, it is one of my three judges, Chief Justice
Beverley McLachlin, Rosalie Silberman Abella, and Marshall
Rothstein, who had to summarize what the case was
about for the registrar because they are the ones who read the
file, not the Registrar! So the Court Summary is about as close
as we're going to get to what the judges say was going on.
Communications law - Broadcasting - Debate program - Allocation
of time - Programming of a partisan political character - Whether
the election candidate's removal from the election debate
amounted to denying him an equitable share of free-time partisan
political broadcasting during an election period as required by
s. 27(4) of the BroadcastingDistribution Regulations, S.O.R./97-
555.
JCT: You'd think the election candidate's removal from the
election debate would have been of interest in a democracy. Ha!
The Applicant, Mr. Turmel, was a candidate in a 2007 Ontario
provincial election. He participated in an elections debate
program hosted by Rogers Cable Communications Inc. At some point
during or shortly after he made his opening statement, he was
removed from the set and not allowed to participate further in
the debate. According to Rogers, Mr. Turmel was removed because
he used his opening statement to take issue with the moderator
and the debate format, he refused to remove a badge despite the
fact that debate rules prohibited him from wearing promotional
material, and he interrupted the opening remarks of a fellow
candidate.
JCT: Cheap to bring in whatever reasons were used when the issue
was that they didn't even need a reason at all.
Mr. Turmel filed a complaint with the Canadian Radio-Television
and Telecommunications Commission ("CRTC") alleging his removal
amounted to denying him an equitable share of free-time partisan
political broadcast during an election period as required by s.
27(4) of the Broadcasting Distribution Regulations.
The CRTC dismissed the complaint. It noted that Mr. Turmel's
request to compel Rogers to provide him with an equitable share
of time in the debate was moot given that the election had
already taken place. In any event, relying on the Ontario Court
of Appeal decision in Vezina v. Canada Broadcasting Corporation
(1993), 51 C.P.R. (3d) 192 (Ont. C.A.), the CRTC found that
Rogers did not breach the broadcasting requirements set out in s.
27(4) of the Regulations because the provision does not apply to
debate programs.
JCT: Okay, they acknowledge that the issue is whether getting
equitable time applies to debates.
Therefore, it was within Rogers' discretion to exclude
participants from the debate who did not comply with the rules
and format set for the program.
JCT: Notice they include the false qualifier instead of facing
the issue that it was within Rogers' discretion to exclude
participants from the debate. Period. Whether they complied with
rules or not. Candidates are excluded from televised debates on a
regular basis who didn't get the chance to comply, they were
simply excluded. So saying I was excluded because I didn't comply
when it wasn't the issue shows their weakness. Cheap shot by the
court to include this when I had already explained it.
Leave to appeal the decision to the Federal Court of Appeal
pursuant to s. 31(2) of the Broadcasting Act, R.S.C. 1985, c. B-
9, was refused. No reasons were given.
JCT: Leave to appeal against Rogers' discretion to exclude
participants from the debate was refused for no reasons.
And now these three Supremes do the same.
Okay, they didn't misrepresent the true issue, they just included
extraneous superfluous reasons to hide the true import of the
policy of power to exclude for any reason. They officially
acknowledged the media may exclude candidates for whatever reason
they wish before going on to the reasons in this particular case
that don't even matter.
So bringing up the interruption (I could not have been
interrupting because it was my opening statement) was a cheap
attempt by the court to make it sound like there was a good
reason for the police taking me away when exposing my party badge
was not.
Is this important enough to warrant approaching the Supreme Court
again? Har har har har. Nyuk, nyuk, nyuk, nyuk, nyuk.