Lawyer seeks to force Quebec MNAs to swear oath to King

A Quebec Superior Court judge is weighing a request to force the province’s members of the National Assembly to swear an oath to the King, after every MNA sworn in since the Oct. 5 election declined to take it.

Constitutional lawyer Lawrence David, a University of Ottawa law professor and founder of the Public Interest Litigation Institute, told a news conference in Ottawa on Oct. 23 that the situation is a “frontal attack” on the Constitution. He is asking the court to suspend Bill 4, a 2022 law that made the oath optional in Quebec, until his challenge to the law is decided. (Quotes translated from French.)

Judge Ian Demers heard arguments last week and is expected to rule before the National Assembly’s 44th legislature opens, scheduled for Nov. 17, CBC News reported. Lawyers for the Quebec attorney general told the court the government is considering pushing the opening to Nov. 24.

David argues that politicians who do not take the oath are not legally entitled to sit, vote on bills or take part in parliamentary business. He said laws passed by a legislature whose majority has not sworn the oath would be illegitimate, and that the lieutenant-governor’s power of royal assent could be affected.

“Politicians, like everyone else, are not above the law,” David said, according to Le Devoir. He said Bill 4 is unconstitutional because it amends a section of the Constitution Act, 1867 that, in his view, Quebec cannot change on its own.

Lawyers for the attorney general argued there is no urgency. They told the court the law has been in place since 2022 and that the legislature has kept functioning and passing laws without difficulty.

Bill 4 was adopted unanimously in December 2022 under the former Coalition Avenir Québec government, after the Parti Québécois’s three MNAs were barred from the Blue Room for refusing to pledge allegiance to King Charles. The PQ, led by Paul St-Pierre Plamondon, won a minority government on Oct. 5. St-Pierre Plamondon has said he will not take the oath, and he asked the lieutenant-governor to skip the cabinet’s swearing-in, as we reported.

Of the 127 members elected, only two have yet to be sworn in because of judicial recounts. The Conservative Party’s Adriana Szalontai is expected to take her seat in Champlain after the PQ conceded that race. In Vachon, a recount confirmed a PQ win, but the Liberals say they will contest the result in court, according to Le Devoir. Details of the first weeks of the new government are in our cabinet swearing-in coverage.

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