In the wake of the legal challenge to Bill 21 on the secular nature of the State, Quebec Attorney General Simon Jolin-Barrette has asked Supreme Court Justice Mahmud Jamal to recuse himself, fearing that he “does not have the impartiality required to hear this case.”
The information, first reported by Le Devoir, was confirmed by The Canadian Press.
In a letter sent to the Supreme Court on Wednesday, the Attorney General of Quebec states that Justice Jamal was the president of the Canadian Civil Liberties Association (CCLA) at the time the association filed an action in Superior Court to challenge the Loi sur la laïcité de l’État in June 2019.
“As president of the association, Judge Jamal was necessarily involved in some way in the preparation of this 194-paragraph proceeding, whether in its drafting, revision or simply in approving its content,” reads the letter, a copy of which was obtained by The Canadian Press.
The letter also states that “the fact that Justice Jamal had to decide questions of constitutional law raised by the association when he was its president means that today he would be the judge in a case in which he was a party.”
The Canadian Press has also obtained letters from the Mouvement laïque québécois (MLQ) and the group Pour les droits des femmes du Québec (PDF Québec), which are also calling for the removal of Judge Jamal for reasons similar to those of Quebec.
However, in a letter dated June 25, the Supreme Court has already indicated that Justice Jamal has no intention of stepping down.
“[He] believes that there is no real or reasonably discernible conflict of interest that would cause him to recuse himself,” reads the letter, which was also obtained by The Canadian Press.
Jamal was appointed to the Supreme Court of Canada on July 1, 2021. He previously served as a judge of the Ontario Court of Appeal from 2019 to 2021, according to the Supreme Court website. Before he was appointed a judge, Jamal was a lawyer with Osler, Hoskin & Harcourt.
Several groups, including the Canadian Civil Liberties Association, have asked the Supreme Court to review the Quebec Court of Appeal’s ruling on Bill 21. The country’s highest court has not yet indicated whether or not it will take up the case.
The federal government has already indicated that it will participate in any legal challenge to Bill 21 before the Supreme Court, while Quebec City has always promised to defend the secular nature of the state “to the end.”
Court of Appeal rules in Quebec City’s favour
Last February, the Court of Appeal validated almost all of Bill 21, affirming that it did not violate the linguistic rights of English-speaking school boards.
The Court of Appeal had also affirmed that Quebec had the right to use the notwithstanding clause preemptively, as it did in the case of Bill 21. This was a major setback for opponents of this legislation.
Bill 21 prohibits government employees in positions of authority — including teachers — from wearing religious symbols such as the Muslim headscarf, the Jewish yarmulke, the Sikh turban and Christian crosses.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published in French on July 4, 2024.