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Ontario Court of Appeal (January 2003) The factum of the Interfaith Coalition on Marriage and Family in Halpern v. Ontario, the marriage case before the Ontario court of appeal. Legal Submissions Intervention Factum Ontario Divional Court (2001) Legal arguments of the Inter-Faith Coalition on Marriage before the Ontario Divisional Court Legal Submissions Intervention Factum

The Supreme Court, by an eight to one majority, ordered the BCCT to approve TWU’s education program. The EFC was an intervenor and appeared before the Court in the case. The majority judgment states, “Absent concrete evidence that training teachers at TWU fosters discrimination in the public schools of B.C., the freedom of individuals to adhere to certain religious beliefs while at TWU should be respected.” The majority judgment said that “tolerance of divergent beliefs is a

(2001) The EFC intervened in the Latimer case before the Supreme Court of Canada. Saskatchewan farmer Robert Latimer was convicted of second degree murder in the death of his disabled daughter Tracy. Mr. Latimer appealed his conviction and sentence, arguing, among other things, that he should have been able to argue the defence of necessity before the lower court, essentially that he had no choice but to kill his daughter Tracy. The EFC joined Physicians for Life and the Chri

The EFC intervened in the Chamberlain v. Surrey School Board case before the B.C. Court of Appeal. The Surrey School Board refused to use three storybooks depicting same-sex parents approved for use in kindergarten and Grade 1 classrooms. A B.C. Supreme Court judge had overturned the decision because it was based on the concerns of religious parents and schools are to be run on a "strictly secular" basis under the B.C. Schools Act. The EFC and the Archdiocese of Vancouver arg

The EFC intervened in the Supreme Court of Canada case Dobson v. Dobson. This case concerns whether a child can sue for injuries he suffered while in the womb in a car accident in which his mother was driving. This case would determine whether Cynthia Dobson, the boy' s mother, and her insurance company were liable for her son' s injuries, if she were found negligent in the accident. The EFC intervened in this case arguing that a mother and unborn child are legally distinct a

Definition of "Spouse" to include same-sex partners (1998) EFC intervened in the Supreme Court of Canada case on the definition of spouse in provincial family legislation,M. v. H. One partner in a lesbian relationship which had ended applied for spousal support under Ontario's Family Law Act. She argued that the definition of spouse in the Family Law Act should include same-sex partners. As a member of the Interfaith Coalition for Marriage and the Family, EFC argued that the

The EFC intervened in the Supreme Court of Canada case Winnipeg Child & Family Services v. G. In this case, the Supreme Court was determining whether the courts can confine pregnant women to treatment programs in order to protect unborn children. The EFC and the Christian Medical Dental Society argued that women owe a duty of care to their unborn children and challenged the legal fiction that a child needs to be "born alive" before it has legal rights. Winnipeg Child and Fami

[1996] 3 S.C.R. 609, 140 D.L.R. (4th) 385, 204 N.R. 81, 95 O.A.C. 1, 40 C.R.R. (2d) 1. Several parents who wished to send their children to private Jewish or Christian schools challenged the lack of public funding for these schools. The Supreme Court of Canada ruled that the Charter rights guarantees cannot be used to challenge section 93 of the Constitution Act, 1867. Justice Iacobucci, writing for the majority, said: In my view, any analysis of denominational school rights

Sexual orientation is an analogous ground of discrimination. (1994) The EFC intervened in the Supreme Court of Canada in this case on the definition of spouse in federal legislation. Two men who had been cohabiting for a number of years argued that the opposite-sex definition of spouse in the Old Age Security Act was unconstitutional. As a member of the Interfaith Coalition for Marriage and the Family, the EFC argued that the definition of spouse is not discriminatory and tha