Nova Scotia’s Crown attorneys created a “breakdown” in the criminal justice system and breached their collective agreement by participating in an illegal walkout, court documents filed by the province are alleging.
The Liberal government argues in an injunction application to be heard Friday in Nova Scotia Supreme Court that the prosecutors’ walkout, which continued Thursday, violates two signed deals stating the union shall not sanction a strike on behalf of the 101 prosecutors.
Its affidavit also says the dropping of an assault case and three impaired driving cases Wednesday due to the absence of prosecutors is evidence the situation is now “an emergency.”
The courts also dismissed charges of domestic assault against a Halifax man, and 10 counts of theft under $5,000 against a man and a woman. In both instances, the judge dismissed the cases due to the unavailability of a Crown prepared to handle the case.
“The Nova Scotia Crown Attorneys’ Association has begun an illegal strike action,” says the document signed by two provincial lawyers.
“The attorney general submits that this is an emergency because the Crowns are not permitted to engage in strikes, and their doing so is having a harrowing effect on the criminal justice system in this province.”
READ MORE: Province files motion for injunction to end Nova Scotia Crown attorney strike
It points to provisions prohibiting strikes in the current collective agreement, which ran from April 1, 2015 to March 31 this year, and to a 30-year, overarching framework agreement signed in 2016.
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Rick Woodburn, the lead negotiator of the Nova Scotia Crown Attorneys’ Association, said in an interview the union is conducting a “lawful protest” against legislation that overrides existing agreements.
He said he intends to contest the injunction, and union lawyers will argue the contract provisions prohibiting a strike are void because the province has violated the framework agreement. He also said the province issued veiled threats during conciliation talks that it would legislate to eliminate the right to binding arbitration in the parties’ framework agreement.
Woodburn said statements by Liberal Premier Stephen McNeil that he won’t allow a third-party arbitrator to dictate wages in the province are evidence the province didn’t intend to honour its own deal.
“It’s a legal protest because the government breached this contract through words and actions,” he said.
The provincial government is in the midst of passing a bill that changes the Crown Attorneys’ Labour Relations Act to override the current framework agreement and give the prosecutors the right to strike while requiring that they provide essential services.
McNeil has said the union’s position calling for a 17 per cent wage over four years, rather than the seven per cent that the province has set as a pattern for public employees’ raises, is unaffordable. He said it would break a wider pattern of pay increases for public employees.
“They made it clear they were going to use arbitration no matter what happened …. This province can’t afford a 17 per cent increase,” the premier said in the legislature on Thursday.
However, the union has said the province is effectively taking away their bargaining rights, as the services provided by the prosecutors are all likely to be deemed essential.
READ MORE: N.S. Crown attorneys give strike notice in protest of government changes
Perry Borden, the president of the Nova Scotia Crown Attorneys’ Association, said it was expected that more cases would be dismissed on Thursday due to a lack of prosecutors.
The union says about 15 Crown attorneys are covering cases involving personal injury, including murders and sexual assaults, but prosecutors won’t handle routine cases.
Tim Houston, the leader of the official Opposition Progressive Conservatives, said the Liberal government signed the 2016 framework agreement allowing arbitration, and is now reneging on the deal.
“They’re not a government that’s willing to honour their word,” Houston said during debate in the legislature.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct 24, 2019.
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