Syed Soharwardy say he will drop his human rights commission complaint against Ezra Levant.
The small matter of legal costs
Human rights defendants liable, even for dropped cases
Calgary Herald
Published: Friday, February 15, 2008
It came as a surprise to hear Syed Soharwardy say he will drop his human rights commission complaint against Ezra Levant.
We applaud it, of course, and also that he says he's prepared to work with Levant to have Alberta's human rights act modified, so that it sticks to its original purposes -- eliminating discrimination in employment and rentals -- and can't be used to silence opinions some groups don't want to hear.
Soharwardy is apparently serious. He attributes his complaint nearly two years ago to a misguided attempt to encourage Muslim youths who he believes felt alienated, after Levant's Western Standard published controversial Danish cartoons depicting the prophet Muhammad.
Of course, it is not the government's job to mend anybody's feelings, only to decide whether they have been bona fide victims of discrimination in a fairly narrow area of jurisdiction. And that Soharwardy could so easily use the law for a purpose other than that for which it was intended, vindicates those who have complained that it favours frivolous or malicious complaints.
At the time, he says, he didn't fully appreciate what free-speech rights meant to people in this country. Now, having listened to Canadian Civil Liberties Association general counsel Alan Borovoy on his recent visit to Calgary, and some close friends, he says he gets it.
Soharwardy told the Herald editorial board Tuesday, "I think freedom of speech is one of the most important benefits of living in Canada, and we should protect it. I think the mandate of the Alberta Human Rights Commission should be limited -- Section 3 (1) (that makes it an offence to publish something likely to expose a person or class of persons to hatred or contempt) should be gone."
Well, well.
There could be an element of enlightened self-interest of course, Soharwardy having made a few borderline statements himself. To compare Palestinian people's travails to the Holocaust, or to characterize Christian relief efforts after a tsunami hit Indonesia as kidnapping Muslim children, is to drink deeply from free speech's well. Those who do so, should by no means try to keep others from the water.
It does leave one bit of unfinished business, though.
Even if Levant feels he has won the argument -- he has, in our view -- it has cost him a lot of money to do it. (Human rights complaints are free to the complainant, but defendants are obliged to fund their own counsel.) As he has remarked, the process is as much the punishment as the ruling.
No less of a chill to the free expression of opinion is the possibility that even if the case is later dropped, it might still be costly to prepare for a defence that will ultimately not be required.
Striking Section 3 (1) from the act should be a priority for the provincial government, whose creature the legislation is. Until that is done, it seems elementary justice that defendants should expect their costs to be met, if the case fails to proceed -- or, if they are exonerated.
© The Calgary Herald 2008
