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On Tuesday, April 21, 1987, Freedom Party hosted a dinner in support of Toronto furrier Paul Magder. Magder was continually charged under Ontario’s Retail Business Holiday’s Act for opening his fur store on Sundays. On April 20, 1987, CBC’s Radio Noon interviewed Freedom Party president Robert Metz about the party’s dinner, and about the party’s nature.
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On February 25, 1987, Freedom Party’s Marc Emery (Action Director) and Robert Metz (President) made separate submissions to the London meeting of a Select Committee on Sunday Shopping. Emery’s submission in part blamed organized religions for the Retail Business Holidays Act‘s ban on opening a retain store on Sundays. That statement got him national attention, including this interview on CBC radio.
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On July 14, 1986, Mr. Justice Dennis O’Leary of the Ontario Divisional Court issued his decision with respect to an Ontario regulation that required government funded schools to open or close each school day with religious exercises consisting of the reading of the Scriptures or other suitable readings and the repeating of the Lord’s Prayer or other suitable prayers. Five families in Sudbury, Ontario, had challenged the constitutionality of the provision under the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, which had been adopted only 4 years earlier. Having lost at trial, the families appealed to the Divisional Court. Divisional Court Justice O’Leary dismissed the appeal. He held that (to quote Ontario’s Court of Appeal):
“…the religious exercises prescribed by s. 28(1) did not infringe the guarantee of freedom of conscience and religion provided by s. 2(a) of the Charter. Alternatively, he held that, if the Charter freedom was infringed, the infringement was justifiable under s. 1 of the Charter which provides:
1. The Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms guarantees the rights and freedoms set out in it subject only to such reasonable limits prescribed by law as can be demonstrably justified in a free and democratic society.
He was of the view that the inculcation of morality was a proper educational object and that morality and religion were intertwined. If this resulted in any infringement on minority religious beliefs, it was not substantial. He pointed out that the religious exercises did not have to be Christian and, except in the case of non-believers, could be consistent with the Charter which, in its preamble, recognizes “the supremacy of God and the rule of law”.
London, Ontario’s AM980 news reported that Justice O’Leary’s decision essentially meant that the Charter’s power to defend the rights and freedoms that it lists were largely meaningless.
NOTE 1: The families later appealed the Divisional Court’s decision to Ontario’s Court of Appeal. On September 23, 1988, Ontario’s Court of Appeal granted the appeal, finding the regulation to be unconstitutional. From the decision of the Court of Appeal for Ontario:
On its face, s. 28(1) of the regulations infringes the freedom of conscience and religion guaranteed by s. 2(a) of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. The recitation of the Lord’s Prayer, which is a Christian prayer, and the reading of the Scriptures from the Christian Bible imposes Christian observances upon non-Christian pupils and religious observances on non-believers. The right to claim exemption from religious exercises conferred by s. 28(10), (11) and (12) does not save the regulation. Section 28 imposes on religious minorities a compulsion to conform to the practices of the majority, and the evidence in this case supports this view. Moreover, the exemption provisions discriminate against religious minorities. Harm to individual pupils need not be proved by those who object to s. 28(1). The denigration of minorities’ freedom of religion and conscience by the operation of s. 28(1) constitutes an infringement of s. 2(a) of the Charter which is not insubstantial or trivial.
The regulation is not justified under s. 1 of the Charter, as the purpose of s. 28(1) is religious. Even if s. 1 applied, the Charter infringement cannot be justified, because s. 28(1) fails to impair the appellants’ freedom under s. 2(a) as little as possible. There are less intrusive ways of imparting educational and moral values than those provided in s. 28.
NOTE 2: This recording includes two reports from AM980 that occurred on the same day. For the purposes of dating this archive entry, it is assumed that Metz’s comment was reported one day after the decision was rendered.
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Following Freedom Party’s successful effort to oppose taxpayer funding for London’s bid to host the 1991 Pan Am Games, the London Bid Committee met with the Mayor of London to canvas ways in which to save the bid. Among the options proposed by the Bid Committee was to have the federal government commit to contribute $37M after the end of the federal government’s five-year games-funding moratorium.
Wayne McLean, host of AM980’s show Hotline, asked his listeners if they want the Bid Committee to continue its efforts to host the 1991 Pan Am Games. McLean invited Freedom Party Action Director Marc Emery for his view on the question. Thereafter, McLean had Bid Committee Chair Gord Hume in-studio to discuss the status of the Bid Committee’s effort and to field calls from listeners. One of those callers was Freedom Party president Robert Metz, who also was Chair of the No Tax for Pan Am Committee. After pointing out to Hume the large number of polls in London indicating that the taxpayer does not want to fund the games, Hume played the smear card, saying that Metz is president of a “radical right wing” political party, as though that were an answer to the public’s condemnation of the Bid Committee’s aims. Metz’s point was reinforced at the end of the show, when listeners were polled: 20 of the 29 people who called in said that the Bid Committee did not have their support. Ultimately, the Bid Committee failed to get the government money that it wanted.
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On June 5, 1985, the Canadian federal government announced that there would be no more federal funding of organized sports events until at least 1990. Freedom Party Action Director Marc Emery and Robert Metz’s No Tax for Pan Am Committee (a committee formed by Freedom Party) had steadily opposed taxpayer funding for London’s bid to host the 1991 Pan Am Games. Flyers and newsletters had been distributed throughout London, and numerous radio and TV appearances of Emery, Metz, and other No Tax for Pan Am activists had tipped popular opinion against taxpayer funding for the games. The federal decision effectively killed the London Bid Committee’s bid to have London host the 1991 Pan Am Games (the London bid committee was comprised largely of local business owners and building contractors who hoped to make a lot of money as a result of taxpayer funding for such things as the building of sports arenas).
On the evening of June 5, 1985, AM980’s Sports Call program interviewed three pro-bid individuals (London East Member of Parliment Jim Jepson; Darwin Semotiuk of the London Bid Committee; and London City Controller Joe Fontana who later would be a London MP, and a London Mayor*), followed by Marc Emery. During their respective interviews, Fontana predicted that the federal government’s decision would be very unpopular, but Emery predicted it would be popular. Thereafter, the program asked listeners to call in and indicate whether they were for or against the federal government’s decision not to fund the games. Emery was right: 74% of callers supported the federal government’s decision not to fund the games with taxpayer money.
*NOTE: In 2014, Joe Fontana resigned as City Mayor after he was found guilty of three fraud-related offences for forging an expense document in 2005 that resulted in a $1,700 government fraud
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At least 2 Sundays prior to the May 2, 1985 polling date of the Ontario general election, radio station AM980 (London, Ontario) hosted a half-hour all candidates debate for candidates in the riding of London North, including Freedom Party candidate Rob Smeenk, and the PC, NDP, and Liberal candidates.
Listen to the entire debate:
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On February 4, 1985, Darwin Semotiuk (member of London’s 1991 Pan Am Games Bid Committee) and Marc Emery (Freedom Party’s Action Director) were guests of the Wayne McLean Talk Show. The topic: taxpayer funding for London, Ontario’s bid for the 1991 Pan Am Games. McLean first interviews Semotiuk, who fields calls including a rather spirited call from Freedom Party president Robert Metz. Thereafter, Emery is interviewed and fields calls from various other London callers to the program.
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On January 24, 1985, AM980’s Sports Call program interviewed Freedom Party Action Director Marc Emery to understand the case against the London bid committee’s bid to host the 1991 Pan Am Games. After explaining that we oppose the bid because it sticks the taxpayer with a hefty bill for the games, the show interviewed Darwin Semotiuk of the London Bid Committee.
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On January 23, 1985, CHRW 94.7 FM’s “Forum” program interviewed Freedom Party Action Director Marc Emery about the London bid committee’s bid for London to host the 1991 Pan Am Games at taxpayer expense. Emery and Freedom Party’s No Tax for Pan Am Games Committee opposed the bid on the ground that it would leave taxpayers footing the bill to host the games, and to pay for the white elephants left behind.
Also interviewed was bid booster Gord Hume.
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This news report on 6X radio in London canvassed the positions of various stakeholders favouring or opposing London’s Pan Am Bid Committee’s bid for London to host the 1991 Pan Am Games at taxpayer expense. Freedom Party Action Director Marc Emery was one of the four individuals interviewed and was, of course, opposed to taxpayer funding for the games.
NOTE: In the report, Emery makes several references to “our group”. The group to which he is referring is Freedom Party and its No Tax for Pan Am Games Committee, which had its own newsletter.