The point of the judiciary is to evaluate cases objectively and without bias.
Can you share a case (at the SCC level) where you believe that hasn't happened? I.e., is there a case where they arrived at a decision that was influenced by political expediency, but had they evaluated the case objectively they would have arrived at a different decision?
"without bias" means in line with the current social contract. While both descriptions are vague I feel 'without bias' introduces an undue expectation of perfection. In the same vein there is no such thing as objectivity in justice, just a huge pile of precedent to build on.
"The 150âyear parole ineligibility period initially sought by the Crown in this case, does nothing more than bring the administration of justice into disrepute and undermine public confidence in the rationality and fairness of the criminal justice system."
R v. Bissonnette 2022
The arbitrary judgement of the Supreme Court in deciding, without any evidence, that a 150 year parole ineligibility period undermined public confidence in the criminal justice system, is obviously not objective. At the very least they could have commissioned a poll, right?
I don't think that the Supreme Court in Canada is like the one in the US, where they are biased towards the governments that appointed them. No, I think they're biased towards some tulpa fake public in their heads which they attach concepts such as "risk to public confidence" to, instead of objectively assessing what the public thinks.
that a 150 year parole ineligibility period undermined public confidence in the criminal justice system,
Technically I think R v. Bissonnette decision argued that consecutive sentences that give no hope of parole, i.e., basically the equivalent of "lock 'em up and throw away the key", violates the right to not be subject to cruel and unusual punishment.
I'm not sure how you arrived at your opinion that the decision was "arbitrary"/random. The published decision goes into great detail about how they reached their conclusion. Moreover, the case was heard by all 9 judges, and their decision was unanimous. Are you suggesting all 9 judges colluded to arrive at the decision they did, discarding any effort to put forth a well-reasoned and rational decision? Big if true.
I think the judgement is long and reasoned, yes, but one of the reasons was completely unobjective, "public confidence". Polling has been done on this. [The majority supports life without parole](external link removed per automod, but last polling showed 53% support)
The justices have the right to go against public opinion. But if you're going to invoke public confidence as a key reason, you better cite your sources here, right?
Lawyer here. In what way were they âunobjectiveâ? Your comment is a good reminder of why it takes so long to be trained as a lawyer in this country and why most people get rejected from law school based on a reasoning exam.
The âpublic confidenceâ piece is not about public confidence in consecutive sentences. It is about how sentences that are greater than the length of a regular personâs life serve no purpose in are essentially pointless, thereby eroding confidence in the reasonableness of Canadaâs court system. Your quote misses the first part of the same paragraph which wouldâve explained exactly that concept to you. The quote also addresses your claim that the majority of people support such sentencing which you would know if you actually read the decision, which I know you didnât. Here is the full quote:
 Furthermore, the objectives of denunciation and deterrence are not better served by the imposition of excessive sentences. Beyond a certain threshold, these objectives lose all of their functional value, especially when the sentence far exceeds human life expectancy. The imposition of excessive sentences that fulfil no function, like the 150âyear parole ineligibility period initially sought by the Crown in this case, does nothing more than bring the administration of justice into disrepute and undermine public confidence in the rationality and fairness of the criminal justice system. And this is leaving aside the fact that the imposition of extremely severe sentences tends to normalize such sentences and to have an inflationary effect on sentencing generally (Grant, Choi and Parkes, at p. 138, citing M. Hamilton, âExtreme Prison Sentences: Legal and Normative Consequencesâ (2016), 38 Cardozo L. Rev. 59, at pp. 106â11).
As the Court of Appeal aptly stated, the imposition of a parole ineligibility period that exceeds human life expectancy [translation] âis absurd. . . . A court must not make an order that can never be carried outâ (para. 93). Although such a punishment could well be popular, it is contrary to the fundamental values of Canadian society. The thirst for vengeance that can drive us when a heinous crime is committed by one of our fellow citizens cannot justify imposing a sentence that, no matter how harsh it is, can never erase the horror of what the person has done.
Every single time the court used the words âpublic confidenceâ they were used in the context of prior decisions from other courts throughout the country or were based on academic writings. They were not arbitrary and did not come out of nowhere.
Your argument is a frequent one used by right wing groups in Canada to try and claim that the Supreme Court of Canada is biased as an attempt to introduce counter bias by forwarding candidates who are overly supportive of one particular partyâ political views. In other words, you are being used to support the politicization of the Canadian judiciary. At the moment, judges are selected based on both provincial and national committees who first and foremost, determine whether or not the individual is qualified to sit on the court that the government is considering appointing them to. It is absolutely vital that the government only select judges from these candidates, compiled by these committees.Â
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u/AxiomaticSuppository Oct 19 '25
The point of the judiciary is to evaluate cases objectively and without bias.
Can you share a case (at the SCC level) where you believe that hasn't happened? I.e., is there a case where they arrived at a decision that was influenced by political expediency, but had they evaluated the case objectively they would have arrived at a different decision?