Proposed changes to Alberta Bill of Rights would prohibit vaccinations without consent

Proposed changes to the Alberta Bill of Rights would allow a worker to take a provincial employer to court if the employee is subject to a vaccination requirement.

“No one should be pressured into accepting any medical treatment without their full consent, including a vaccine,” Premier Danielle Smith said at a news conference Monday prior to the introduction of Bill 24, the Alberta Bill of Rights Amendment Act.

The government says the legislation, introduced later Monday by Justice Minister Mickey Amery, would broaden Albertans’ personal rights while strengthening property rights and protections for owners of legally acquired firearms.

However, University of Alberta law professor Eric Adams says he sees nothing in the bill that could alter Albertans’ firearms or property rights.

“Really nothing is being provided of substance that I can see,” he said of the firearms provisions.

Adams said the changes proposed to prevent coercion of medical procedures could both prevent agencies from requiring immunizations and spark legal challenges to policies.

If passed, Bill 24 would protect a person from being coerced into receiving medical care, treatment or a procedure — but not if “that individual is likely to cause substantial harm to themselves or others,” a briefing document on the bill says.

Vaccination would be an exception, according to officials. If the bill passes as written, no one could force a person to be vaccinated to prevent harm to themselves or others.

On Oct. 11, 2022, the day she was sworn in as premier, Smith said people who chose not to get the COVID-19 vaccine and were suspended from work or barred from stores or restaurants during the pandemic were “the most discriminated-against group” she had seen in her lifetime.

Smith had campaigned for leadership of the United Conservative Party promising to amend the Alberta Human Rights Act to prevent discrimination based on vaccination status. That act applies to private employers. She later backed away from that move.

Should they pass, Smith’s proposed changes to the Alberta Bill of Rights would apply to provincial public employers, and those under government control, such as municipalities or police services.

In a briefing with reporters, Alberta Justice officials said determining which organizations would or wouldn’t be subject to the bill  would have to be tested in court.

Adams said because the Alberta Bill of Rights applies to other provincial laws, there could be a “trickle-down effect” of the public requirements into the private sector.

The bill also proposes to expand the scope of the Bill of Rights to provincial policies and programs, beyond just provincial law. It would only apply to ongoing and future infringements on Albertans’ rights.

“This would include infringements that began before the amendments take effect, but continue after the amendments take effect,” briefing documents explain.

Smith said the Alberta government will not mandate employees to receive any medical treatments they don’t want to take.

Such requirements are already in place. The communicable disease regulation under Alberta’s Public Health Act, for example, requires all daycare staff and anyone having face-to-face contact with patients in health facilities to be immunized against rubella.

AHS also recommends health-care workers be fully immunized against tetanus, whooping cough, measles, Hepatitis B and other infections.

Amery said the bill is worded to allow law enforcement to continue to apprehend people under the Mental Health Act.

The legislation would also allow officials to force an adult who has lost decision-making capacity into addictions treatment. The government has signalled so-called “compassionate intervention” legislation is coming.

Amery said some of the proposed changes come as a result of recommendations from a post-pandemic provincial government-appointed panel that studied how the government could limit interventions on personal freedoms during future public emergencies.

Lorian Hardcastle , University of Calgary health law associate professor, says the vague wording of the bill leaves many questions to be answered by the courts. Hardcastle says it’s unclear whether requiring vaccination to enter a business or public facility, or requiring workers to be immunized, constitutes “coercion,” because the bill doesn’t define it.

“And we don’t know what the courts will do with that,” she said.

This uncertainty could prompt employers to avoid policies that might run afoul of a new Bill of Rights, she said.

“The province is in some way, tying their own hands in terms of how they may be able to respond to a future public health emergency,” she said.

Promise of protection for property owners, gun owners

The bill also seeks to beef up the rights of property owners. Smith said landowners should be compensated not just for expropriation, but when governments are “regulating away the use of property.”

Adams said the courts are already grappling with whether expropriation includes regulations that severely limit property use.

The bill also proposes to add the “right to acquire, keep and use firearms in accordance with the law” to the Bill of Rights. Smith said it’s to push back against what she says is tightening federal government gun control measures increasingly targeting legal gun owners and users.

“We’re sending a message to Ottawa that Alberta will not forfeit these rights,” Smith said.

The proposed changes would allow courts to assign a penalty or institute a remedy if they find a person or entity has breached the Bill of Rights.

NDP leader: ‘Who asked for this?’

Prior to the bill’s tabling, NDP Leader Naheed Nenshi said any bolstering of Albertans’ medical rights should include guaranteed access to abortion services and gender-affirming health care for transgender youth.

The government is expected to table three bills in the fall sitting that will limit trans rights.

“Who asked for this?” Nenshi told reporters. “No Albertan has a priority saying, ‘We want the right to bear arms subject to federal laws,’ or, ‘We want the right to keep our property just as we do today.'”

A group of grassroots UCP members called the Black Hat Gang is pushing Smith’s government to expand the Bill of Rights further, embracing an American-inspired right to bear arms, and a right to use “sufficient force” to protect private property.

Smith did not directly answer a question on Monday about whether Albertans can expect to see future updates to the Bill of Rights.

“We’re going to stay in our own lane,” she said.

She said nothing in the current bill changes Albertans’ reproductive rights.