This is posted totally without permission, re the Supreme Court of Canada's
rather odd decision of Thursday on rights for same-sex couples. Southam News
feeds major dailies like the Montreal Gazette, Ottawa Citizen and Vancouver
Sun. The story is front-page in most Friday papers across the country.
 
On another subject, the Premier of Saskatchewan promised this week to
lesbian and gay people to groups covered under the Saskatchewan human rights
code. Just the opposite to Alberta next door.
 
 
BY STEPHEN BINDMAN
SOUTHAM NEWS
Ottawa
 
     The Supreme Court of Canada has avoided a definitive ruling on whether
gay couples should received the same employment benefits as heterosexuals.
    In a long-awaited judgment, the country's top court said a
 federal translator was not discriminated against when he was denied a paid
 day of leave in 1985 to attend the funeral of his homosexual lover's
 father.
    In a 4-3 ruling, the Court said gay and lesbian couples do
 not constitute a family under the Canadian Human Rights Act as it stood at
 the time Brian Mossop began his legal fight.
    Chief Justice Antonio Lamer said Parliament didn't intended to
 protect gay couples when it amended the human rights law in 1983 to
 prohibit discrimination based on family status.
    But Lamer said his interpretation of the term family status ``might
 have been entirely different'' if Parliament had added sexual orientation
 to the law's list of prohibited grounds of discrimination.
    Lamer also said the court might have given a ``much more complete
 and lasting solution to the present problem'' had the human rights law been
 challenged under the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.
    ``Nor should this decision be interpreted as meaning that
 homosexual couples cannot constitute a family for the purposes of
 legislation other than the (human rights act),'' Lamer wrote in the
majority ruling.
    In fact, former justice minister Kim Campbell introduced a bill in
 Parliament before Christmas to add sexual orientation to the human rights
 law.
    As well, last August the Ontario Court of Appeal effectively added
 the gay rights clause to the law when it ruled its absence violated the
 charter.
    Ottawa did not appeal the ruling and Campbell said the government
 would apply it across the country even though it is technically only
 binding in Ontario.
    ``Essentially, what the court is doing is putting off the issue an
 inviting us to come back again,'' said Shelagh Day, vice-president of the
 National Action Committee on the Status of Women.
    ``The overall effect of the decision is to delay resolution of this
 matter and require us to engage in more litigation before we achieve
 equality for lesbians and gay men.''
    Justice Department lawyer Barb McIsaac said the ruling ``leaves
 unanswered'' what rights gay couples have under the human rights law or the
 charter.
    Mossop, who works for the Secretary of State, and his partner Ken
 Popert have lived together since 1976, jointly own a home and have a sexual
 relationship.
    Under Mossop's union contract, employees can take up to four days'
 bereavement leave upon the death of a member of their immediate family
 including fathers-in-law of married heterosexuals.
    When Mossop was denied leave to attend the funeral of Popert's
 father, he complained to the Canadian Human Rights Commission that he was
 discriminated on the basis of his family status.
    Three dissenting Supreme Court justices said the scope of family
 status was ``sufficiently broad'' to include same-sex partners and a human
 rights tribunal was within its right to decide Mossop was discriminated
 against.
    ``While it is arguable that the `traditional family' has an
 ideological stronghold, it is clear that a large number of Canadians do not
 live within traditional families,'' wrote Madam Justice Claire L'Heureux
-Dube.
    ``Given the range of human preferences and possibilities, it is not
 unreasonable to conclude that families may take many forms.''