Tag Archives: Charter of Rights

Expert: FATCA Violates Charter

FATCA, , ,

Here is what Tim promised yesterday.  Arrow’s article from Vancouver Sun:
Compliance with FATCA May Violate Charter of Rights
Great news to wake up to this morning. Many thanks to Noble Dreamer for posting this under What’s New, Just Me for tweeting it and Tim for the advance notice.  Special thanks to Arrow for his dogged determination to get this article out there.
Forner Dean of Osgoode Law School and Canadian Constitutional expert Peter Hogg outlines the Charter issues in a five page submission to Finance Canada.  That includes:

“In my opinion, the procedures mandate by the Model IGA are discriminatory in a way that would not withstand Charter scrutiny,” Hogg says in his letter. “These procedures effectively treat individuals differently, and adversely, based on an immutable personal characteristic, specifically citizenship. If Parliament were to enact legislation authorizing and permitting this type of differential and adverse treatment, the legislation would contravene the equality protections in section 15 of the Charter.”

The article goes on to outline other areas of the Charter which FATCA may contravene. These include Sec. 7 (protects “liberty”) and Sec. 8 (“unreasonable search and seizure”).
Canadians, read the article and rejoice!
If CBA or Finance Canada are following us, be prepared for that class action lawsuit if you or the government dare to try to violate our rights!
With more than a million Canadians adversely affected by this, the odds of a class-action suit coming together look pretty good.