Know Your New Rights

P.F. McKenna was librarian at the Police Academy, Brampton, Ontario.

Michael McDonald, a lawyer and teacher who has recently been appointed Vice Chairman of the Copyright Institute, has written a brief guide on some implications of the new Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms for the ordinary citizen. He attempts to guide the reader through various situations where he may come into contact with the law and the custodians of our legal system, most notably the police. The first chapter contains a cursory overview of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms (Part I of the Constitution Act 1982 which forms Schedule B of the Canada Act) and presents some of its basic provisions. The next three chapters deal with the rights of the citizen when approached by officers of the law on the street or in his car, office, or home. The fifth chapter examines the Canadian citizen’s rights with relation to police arrest, and the next chapter addresses the person’s rights when inside the police station. Chapters 7 and 8 examine the means by which a person arrested may get himself released from prison and how one should go about getting a lawyer. The last chapter contains a short discussion of the relationship of the new Charter to the civil law. Appendices are included which contain the Charter, the Canadian Bill of Rights (which is still part of Canadian law), and the American Bill of Rights.

Mr. McDonald has taken some trouble in examining the new Charter, and he has organized his book in a fairly clear manner. However, as an authoritative guide to how citizens ought to behave when encountering the police or the courts, this work is somewhat premature. With a new Charter, as with any recently enacted legislation of any significance, it takes some time before our lawyers and judges are able to apply the law comfortably and confidently. Mr. McDonald himself points out in a number of instances that the definitive interpretation of certain sections of the Charter has yet to be formulated. One example from his book relates to the status of Writs of Assistance, which grant wide powers to officers of the R.C.M.P. Nor does Mr. McDonald give very careful attention to the puzzling ambiguity of many of the terms and phrases used in the Charter, such as “a free and democratic society,” “the principles of fundamental justice,” or “unreasonable search and seizure.” Until more Charter cases have been heard, and clear judgments rendered, it is really too early to make the claims that Mr. McDonald would like to assert for this book.