Francis Campbell
Saltwire
October 21, 2022
The Eastern Shore Forest Watch Association, which had launched legal action against the province in February 2020 to challenge the previous Liberal government’s handling of the Owls Head file, was back in court Wednesday arguing its case before a three-judge Nova Scotia Court of Appeal panel.
“There still remains the fact that the government, the province, made that decision in secret and we’re arguing the fact that is not a fair way to make that decision, that they should have made that decision in a transparent fashion.”
Jamie simpson, lawyer for the applicants
… In late July 2021, Justice Christa M. Brothers of the Nova Scotia Supreme Court dismissed the forest watch’s judicial review application, writing in her decision “there is no recognized common law duty of procedural fairness owed by the Crown to the public at large.”
“Whether it happens through the courts or it happens by law, people would like to see this dealt with so the situation can’t happen again,” Lindsay Lee, secretary of the association, said this past June of the Rankin decision to originally delist Owls Head.
So, instead of dropping the appeal, the association took it to the Appeals Court and justices Duncan Beveridge, Peter Bryson and Elizabeth Van den Eynden heard arguments Wednesday.
