{"id":453973,"date":"2026-02-04T20:05:08","date_gmt":"2026-02-04T20:05:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/453973\/"},"modified":"2026-02-04T20:05:08","modified_gmt":"2026-02-04T20:05:08","slug":"justice-minister-fraser-rebuffs-smiths-call-for-more-say-over-judicial-appointments","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/453973\/","title":{"rendered":"Justice Minister Fraser rebuffs Smith\u2019s call for more say over judicial appointments"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a style=\"display:block\" href=\"https:\/\/www.theglobeandmail.com\/resizer\/v2\/26ARRJFQYJA4DEW6LAZE2ROOM4.JPG?auth=c4ce6d045b1a97dbeba2166970920359998bfe9b10cd05fc2a1de1e3081b4aad&amp;width=600&amp;height=400&amp;quality=80&amp;smart=true\" aria-haspopup=\"true\" data-photo-viewer-index=\"0\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Open this photo in gallery:<\/a><\/p>\n<p class=\"figcap-text\">Justice Minister Sean Fraser says Ottawa plans to stick to the current process for appointing judges.Patrick Doyle\/Reuters<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-article-body__text text-pr-5\">Federal Justice Minister Sean Fraser has rejected Alberta Premier Danielle Smith\u2019s appeal for the province to have more say over judicial appointments.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-article-body__text text-pr-5\">Ms. Smith said on Tuesday she would withhold some judicial funding if Ottawa did not agree to her demands. <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-article-body__text text-pr-5\">But Mr. Fraser said he will be sticking with the current process. <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-article-body__text text-pr-5\">\u201cI\u2019m planning to maintain the process that we have in place that has independence, that has rigour, that has led to stellar candidates being appointed, including as recently in Alberta,\u201d Mr. Fraser told journalists on his way to a weekly meeting of the Liberal caucus. <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-article-body__text text-pr-5\">\u201cWe welcome the feedback from representatives of the Alberta government through that process and they have participated. It\u2019s been very helpful. I hope they continue to participate.\u201d <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-article-body__text text-pr-5\">Ms. Smith\u2019s call marks the latest effort to assert more provincial political power over the judicial process.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-article-body__text text-pr-5\">In a letter to the Prime Minister as well as a news release this week, Ms. Smith also said she wants the province to have a greater say in appointments to the Supreme Court of Canada, and for Ottawa to reduce bilingualism requirements for judges on the top court.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-article-body__text text-pr-5\">Alberta MP Corey Hogan said that the constitutional law is clear, and you don\u2019t need to be a lawyer to understand it.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-article-body__text text-pr-5\">\u201cYou can\u2019t say, \u2018Oh, I want to appoint federal judges so absent that, I\u2019m just going to withhold funding,\u2019\u201d the Liberal member told journalists outside the caucus meeting. \u201cThat\u2019s not the way that the Constitution works.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-article-body__text text-pr-5\">Former federal cabinet minister Steven Guilbeault said Quebec has also sought more influence over the process.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-article-body__text text-pr-5\">\u201cQuebec has been saying, for some time, that they want more say in the nomination of judges,\u201d Mr. Guilbeault, formerly the environment and Canadian heritage minister, said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Open this photo in gallery: Justice Minister Sean Fraser says Ottawa plans to stick to the current process&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":453974,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[43,44,714,41,39,42,40],"class_list":["post-453973","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-headlines","tag-news","tag-politics","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/453973","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=453973"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/453973\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/453974"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=453973"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=453973"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=453973"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}