Webinar | The (Dis)Connect between Legislative Drafting and Statutory Interpretation: Perspectives from Three Branches of Government (1:29:10)
Date: November 26, 2024
Location: Online
OVERVIEW
Legislative drafting is viewed as a specialized area of law that requires particular education, skills and experience. A legislative drafter’s legal opinion is that the text will have a certain legal effect when the relevant interpretative provisions are considered. To this end, professional legislative drafters follow specific drafting conventions, styles and practices.
However, drafting conventions are not well known by legal professionals outside of the specialized drafting community, nor are they commonly referenced by parties in court or in judicial reasons. This raises questions regarding their value in the statutory interpretation exercise, and what more could be done to increase familiarity with drafting conventions to those outside the professional legislative drafter community.
Further, principles of statutory interpretation have developed with reference to the way that drafters and drafting offices operate; however, contemporary realities may call reliance on some of these principles into question.
In this webinar, professionals from three branches of government discuss the theory and realities of drafting and statutory interpretation, and provide recommendations regarding how they can be better reconciled.
Panelists:
- Gabriela Dedelli, Parliamentary Counsel, Legislative Assembly of Ontario
- The Hounourable Justice Gareth Morley, Judge of the Supreme Court of British Columbia in Victoria
- Christina Wasyliw, Deputy Legislative Counsel & General Counsel, MB Justice
Moderator: Jaimie Graham, Legal Counsel, Alberta Utilities Commission
RESOURCE: Legislative Drafting in Statutory Interpretation: A Plea for Recognition – Gabriela Dedelli