Legal Action Against Bill 223 - Legal Arugments

Legal Action Against Bill 223 - Arguments

The application seeks an order that the Act violates sections 7, 12, and 15 of the Charter for the following reasons:

• Section 7 of the Charter provides that every Canadian has the right to life, liberty, and security of the person and that they cannot be denied those rights unless it happens in a manner that is consistent with fundamental justice. By closing SCS, the Act will infringe on the life, liberty, and security of the person of the people who depend on these services. People who no longer have access to these services face a dramatically increased risk of death by overdose; they will be forced to resort to unhealthy and unsafe consumption — this engages their life interest. Second, individuals who will be forced to consume outside of these sites will be exposed to a higher risk of criminal sanction — thereby engaging their liberty interest. This is because SCS are protected by a federal exemption from the application of criminal laws related to the possession of drugs. Finally, the Act infringes SCS service users’ security of person interest. Without supervised consumption, the data is clear that they will be exposed to a higher risk of infectious disease and other harms to their health, including their mental health.

• Section 12 of the Charter protects Canadians from cruel and unusual punishment. People who use drugs have come to rely on these services for their daily survival. Without these services, people who use drugs will be exposed to substantially increased risk of death, disease and a variety of other harms. Ontario knew this when it passed the Act but proceeded to pass it anyway. By doing so, Ontario knowingly increased the likelihood of death and grievous bodily harm.

• Section 15 of the Charter guarantees the right to be free from discrimination. It is clear that the Act discriminates against people who use SCS. People who use SCS are accessing services critical to their survival and health. Under the Act, the only reason they will be denied these services is because of an immutable characteristic that they have: they have a substance use disability. Denying them real and meaningful access to these services will exacerbate real disadvantages that individuals from this group already suffer from. Most service users are marginalized and disadvantaged. These disadvantages are even more pronounced for service users who also identify as women or who are Indigenous or are otherwise racialized. Denying these individuals access to these services will only make it harder for them to get the health services they desperately need for no reason other than the fact that they suffer from a disability that the Government of Ontario has targeted.