OTTAWA \u2014 Justice Minister Sean Fraser says the new Supreme Court justice will be appointed \u201cimminently\u201d as the prime minister is set to pick from two top candidates to replace retired Justice Sheilah Martin.<\/p>\n
\u201cI expect that this appointment will be made imminently\u2026 we\u2019ll be moving as quick as we possibly can,\u201d Fraser told National Post on Tuesday. \u201cWhen there is an ability to get a job done, he\u2019s not one to wait,\u201d Fraser added of Prime Minister Mark Carney.<\/p>\n
Multiple government and judicial sources confirmed to National Post that the two candidates being considered by Carney are Glenn Joyal and Anna Loparco. The sources were granted anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the appointment process publicly.<\/p>\n
Joyal is the chief justice of the Court of King\u2019s Bench of Manitoba, a job he\u2019s held since 2011. Loparco was appointed as a judge to the Court of King\u2019s Bench of Alberta in 2019.<\/p>\n
Through an Alberta Courts spokesperson, Justice Loparco decline to comment for this story. Manitoba Courts spokesperson Aimee Fortier declined to pass on National Post\u2019s request for comment to Chief Justice Joyal, saying that the inquiry \u201cdoesn\u2019t fall within the type judges would generally respond to.\u201d<\/p>\n
With retired Supreme Court Justice Sheilah Martin\u2019s seat vacant since May 30, Carney is expected to nominate his preferred candidate before the end of the month after presenting his decision to cabinet, the sources said.<\/p>\n
The government will then convene a parliamentary committee hearing for the nominated candidate, after which the prime minister is expected to officialize the appointment. All of that could also happen by the end of June as well, though the timing is still not settled, the sources said.<\/p>\n
In a statement, prime minister\u2019s office spokesperson Ren\u00e9e Procter neither confirmed nor denied the identity of the top candidates nor the timeline for the appointment, saying that information about the appointment \u201cwill be shared in due course.\u201d<\/p>\n
Joyal and Loparco are the two only candidates recommended by the Independent Advisory Board (IAB) established by the Liberals to receive, triage and recommend applicants for the Supreme Court vacancy to the Minister of Justice, two sources confirmed.<\/p>\n
The fact that the IAB ultimately only recommended two candidates will likely give court watchers and government officials some pause, as its government-granted mandate states it \u201cmust submit to the Prime Minister\u2026 the names of at least three, but up to five, qualified and functionally bilingual candidates.\u201d<\/p>\n
The IAB also submits its recommendations to the minister of justice, who then presents them to the prime minister alongside his recommended path forward.<\/p>\n
Both Loparco and Joyal are fluently trilingual and speak English, French and Italian. They are also both known for advocating for better access to justice for French speakers in their respective provinces.<\/p>\n
Joyal\u2019s name has long circulated as a potential Supreme Court pick for one of the court\u2019s two seats traditionally reserved for a candidate from Western Canada. He is widely viewed as the favourite for the current opening.<\/p>\n
After his application to the top court in 2017 was controversially leaked to media, Joyal confirmed in 2019 to The Canadian Press that he had applied but had withdrawn his application due to his wife\u2019s health issues.<\/p>\n
He is well known in and outside of judicial circles and is an outspoken chief justice on issues impacting his court, such as French-language services, judicial independence and Indigenous access to justice. Earlier this year, he argued that judges shouldn\u2019t be afraid to speak up in defence of the judiciary.<\/p>\n
Last month, Joyal released a landmark decision finding that the federal and Manitoba governments had breached First Nations\u2019 rights to self-governance on the issue of child welfare.<\/p>\n
Loparco\u2019s candidacy will likely surprise court watchers, as she is not as high-profile as Joyal and some other rumoured applicants.<\/p>\n
A first-generation Canadian born from Italian parents, Loparco was first appointed in 2019 to the Court of King\u2019s Bench of Alberta. She is known in the province as a family law specialist.<\/p>\n
In an undated profile published by the Canadian Bar Association<\/a>, Loparco said that she co-chaired her court\u2019s Restorative Justice, Family Law and French committees. She also said she strives to speak and write \u201cin plain language\u201d and make self-represented litigants \u201cfeel heard and understood\u201d.<\/p>\n In a separate profile in 2023,<\/a> Loparco said she worked hard upon her appointment to make restorative justice part of the court\u2019s program.<\/p>\n \u201cIn practice, restorative justice means juveniles and some people charged with non-violent crimes can be diverted away from the court system, sparing them jail time. In more serious cases, it doesn\u2019t replace prison, but it can influence a judge\u2019s sentencing recommendation,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n Sources familiar with the IAB\u2019s work said the advisory committee received only nine applications this time, a record low since former prime minister Justin Trudeau reformed the SCC appointment process in 2016 and created the first committee.<\/p>\n Fraser neither confirmed nor denied the number of applicants for the positions, but said he is not concerned by the drop in candidates.<\/p>\n \u201cThere may be individuals who are coming into the process with some assumptions about the likelihood of success. There may be others who are looking at the field of applicants who are trying to self-assess whether they think the chances are realistic that they be appointed. There could be 100 reasons,\u201d Fraser said.<\/p>\n \u201cI have no reservations about the quality of candidates who are going to come through the process. I\u2019m highly confident that we will find a highly skilled jurist that will fill the vacancy that Justice Martin leaves.\u201d<\/p>\n National Post<\/p>\n cnardi@postmedia.com<\/p>\n Our website is the place for the latest breaking news, exclusive scoops, longreads and provocative commentary. Please bookmark nationalpost.com<\/a> and sign up for our politics newsletter, First Reading, here<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"OTTAWA \u2014 Justice Minister Sean Fraser says the new Supreme Court justice will be appointed \u201cimminently\u201d as the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":93512,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[98],"tags":[35063,33650,35062,35064,35061,111,5430,34527,14494,140],"class_list":["post-93511","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mark-carney","tag-anna-loparco","tag-appointment","tag-glenn-joyal","tag-iab","tag-justice-joyal","tag-mark-carney","tag-national-post","tag-sean-fraser","tag-supreme-court","tag-the-prime-minister"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/93511","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=93511"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/93511\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/93512"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=93511"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=93511"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=93511"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}