Potential legal challenge looms for vaccine certificates

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Just two days into the vaccine certificate system, the battle over the new passports to enter “higher risk” settings might become a legal tussle.

The Justice Centre for Constitutional Freedoms says it has sent a legal warning letter to the Ontario government on behalf of four clients demanding the vaccine passport mandate be revoked immediately.

“Mandating a system that denies Canadian’s access to certain services that are arbitrarily defined as nonessential by the government creates a slippery slope and sets a dangerous descent into a medical dictatorship,” said Henna Parmar, a lawyer with the centre.

The centre wrote to the Ontario government saying that it will file legal action if the province fails to halt what the centre considers “its unconstitutional discrimination” against those who have not yet chosen to receive what the centre calls “experimental vaccines.”

Since the vaccine passport was announced, the centre says it has received hundreds of emails from concerned Ontarians.

As of Wednesday, anyone seeking to access select settings that include restaurants, bars, gyms, concert halls, professional sporting events and gambling halls must show proof they’ve received both doses of vaccine.

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The centre’s demand letter asserts mandatory vaccination for COVID constitutes a significant, unwarranted and profound infringement on the rights of Canadians “that cannot be justified in a free and democratic society.”

“Ontarians should not be coerced or pressured by the government into submitting to a medical intervention to which they do not consent,” says Jorge Pineda, a lawyer with the centre. “It will be a tragedy to see Ontarians, including children, being coerced to take the vaccine, or else be socially marginalized,”

Premier Doug Ford reiterated Wednesday the certificate system will not be permanent and that it is needed to avoid having COVID-19 cases spin out of control.

Also Wednesday, Ontario’s Human Rights Commission (OHRC) said it is okay with the vaccine certificate system.

“OHRC takes the position that mandating and requiring proof of vaccination to protect people at work or when receiving services is generally permissible under the Human Rights Code as long as protections are put in place to make sure people who are unable to be vaccinated for Code-related reasons are reasonably accommodated,” the commission said in a letter spelling out its position.