On October 13, 2016, the Federal Court (per O’Reilly J.) issued judgment and reasons in the application for judicial review concerning unfilled Senate vacancies.

The Court concluded that the application was moot given that the current Prime Minister “has initiated a new process for appointing Senators, has actually made a number of appointments to the Senate, and has committed to making more appointments in the near future.”

The Court declined to exercise its discretion to decide an otherwise moot case, noting “that there does not appear to be a genuine adversarial context”, the constitutional issue at stake is not one seen as being evasive of judicial review, and that “it is hard to see a significant social cost that the Canadian public would bear if the question Mr. Alani has raised went unanswered for now”. With respect to judicial resources, “a full judgment on the merits would likely require weeks of analysis and writing that could be devoted instead to cases where the parties are engaged in a concrete and significant dispute that demands timely resolution.”

The Court further ordered that Mr. Alani pay the government’s costs.

A copy of the full text judgment is available for download here.