Premier Doug Ford’s cabinet will determine next week whether to appeal a court decision that the government’s mandatory
gas-pump decals are “unconstitutional.”
Progressive Conservative sources confirmed to the Star on Tuesday that ministers will meet to discuss the issue at Queen’s Park on Sept. 16.
In a blow to the government, Mr. Justice Edward Morgan of the Ontario Superior Court of Justice ruled the stickers, which attack federal carbon-pricing measures, violated the Charter rights of business owners.
Morgan’s 17-page decision came after the Canadian Civil Liberties Association launched a legal challenge that argued the stickers violated business owners’ Charter rights.
“A government or political party can, in the words of Ontario’s Minister of Energy (Greg Rickford), ‘stick it to’ another tier of government of political party as a matter of free speech in an election campaign or otherwise,” the judge wrote in a ruling released Friday.
“But a government cannot legislate a requirement that private retailers post a sticker designed to accomplish that task. The mandatory fuel pump sticker is an unconstitutional attempt to do just that,” he said.
The civil liberties association went to court because it felt that forcing gas stations to post the messages was “a form of compelled political expression.”
Rickford — whose April 2019 comment that “we’re going to stick it to the Liberals and remind the people of Ontario how much this job-killing regressive carbon tax costs” was a cornerstone of the judge’s decision — has been coy on the government’s next steps.
In a statement Friday, he said “we respect the decision of the court, but our government will always stand up for the people of Ontario when it comes to matters that make everyday life more expensive for hardworking families.”
On Tuesday, Rickford’s office would only say: “We respect the decision of the courts. We do not have any further updates at this time.”
Senior officials, speaking on background in order to discuss internal deliberations, said the matter must go to a full cabinet meeting next week.
The controversial Tory-blue stickers, unveiled last year, read “the federal carbon tax will cost you.” But they do not mention the offsetting federal carbon rebates families receive.
Some 25,000 were manufactured — at a cost to taxpayers of $4,954 — and they are frequently vandalized.
The decals have had adhesive problems and been criticized by the Ontario Chamber of Commerce after the Tories initially said scofflaws would face fines of up to $10,000 a day for not posting them.
Opposition parties are urging the government not to appeal Morgan’s ruling.
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