Succession to the british throne: the record should be heard by the Court of appeal

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In 2011, when prince William and his wife Kate had not yet had their first child, the Commonwealth countries had agreed to modernize “the rules of succession to the throne in order to allow the first born to succeed to the Crown without regard to the gender”.

Kathleen Frenette

Monday, 19 February 2018 16:01

UPDATE
Monday, 19 February 2018 16:09

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The Court of appeal heard the case on the succession to the british throne first rejected, in February 2016, by a judge of the superior Court.

Two years ago, judge Claude Bouchard ruled that Ottawa had the right to give its agreement to the modification in the british aimed to modernise the rules of succession to the throne.

However, according to Patrick Taillon, and Geneviève Motard, since Canada is a sovereign country “to have repatriated its constitution”, it should obtain the consent of the provinces because it is a change to the Constitution of Canada.

By doing this, the two lawyers to the origin of the legal proceedings wished to declare unconstitutional the canadian law of 2013 on the succession to the throne, which had been rejected by the magistrate.

For the appellants, “the judgment is breach of the independence of Canada and its Constitution, the first judge who concluded to the existence of a royal succession hereditary determined by the United Kingdom and, therefore, the automatic application of the changes foreseen by the british Act of 2013 in Canada.”

To the contrary, the attorney general of Canada is of the opinion that the judge of first instance has not committed any error and, in addition, he has “grasped the scope of the principle according to which the Queen (or King) of Canada is in fact and law a person who is, according to the rules of the estate from time to time established by the Parliament of the United Kingdom, the Queen (or King) of the United Kingdom”.

According to them, this principle is implemented by “a rule of automatic recognition” which does not contravene in nothing “the principle of the independence of Canada”.

We should remember that it is in 2011, when prince William and his wife Kate had not yet had their first child, that the 16 Commonwealth countries present at the summit in Perth, Australia, had agreed to modernize “the rules of succession to the throne in order to allow the first born to succeed to the Crown without regard to the gender”.

In 2013, to give effect to the commitment, the federal Parliament had adopted a law to “consent” to the amendment of the rules of royal succession.

By the adoption of this law, the legislature said not to change the canadian law because he was merely “to agree to changes adopted by the british Parliament”.