This week on Legally Speaking with Michael Mulligan:

More than three days after flooding caused massive damage in BC, the provincial government declared an emergency pursuant to the Emergency Program Act.

The emergency declaration lasts for up to 14 days and can be renewed.

Pursuant to the authority this affords, the provincial government has restricted travel on damaged highways and has limited consumers to purchasing no more than 30 liters of fuel at a time.

The provincial government doesn’t directly employ people to repair roads and relies on contractors for the work that is required.

The provincial government does, however, have a direct role in providing information during an emergency. In this case, very little information was made available by the provincial government for several days. Timely information concerning damage and repair efforts was available on social and traditional media.

In addition to authorizing emergency orders, the Emergency Program Act prohibits civil claims against the government or people asked to conduct repair work relating to disasters for anything they do, or fail to do, absent gross negligence.

A small claims case over a couch damaged by a moving company is also discussed on the show.

The couch was damaged while attempting to move it through a door to an apartment.

The moving company relied on provisions of an email sent to the couch owner, after she booked the move, the purported to limit the liability of the moving company for items that were damaged in the move.

The legal principles discussed included the concept of a “bailee for reward”.

A bailee for reward is someone paid to keep or deal with property. It’s distinct from someone who agrees to do this for free, such a friend who helps you move.

A bailee for reward has the onus of proving that damage to property they were paid to deal with was not damaged by negligence.

A second legal principle that was relevant to the case was that limits of liability unilaterally added after a contract is entered into may not be effective. In this case, the email with the limitation on liability was sent after the contract to move the couch was entered into over the phone.

Finally, on the show, a Supreme Court of Canada case dealing with sentencing “ranges” or “starting points” is discussed. The case involved two men who were convicted of trafficking large amounts of fentanyl. They were sentenced to 7 and 11 years at trial. The Alberta Court of Appeal increased the sentences to 10 and 14 years saying that the starting point for this offence should be 10 years.

The concept of a Court of Appeal setting a starting point for sentences is controversial because parliament hasn’t seen fit to set a minimum sentence and because the Court of Appeal is only supposed to interfere was a sentence imposed by a trial judge if it’s demonstrably unfit.

The Supreme Court of Canada upheld the increased sentences, and the idea of a starting point or range of sentence being set out by a Court of Appeal. It did, however, conclude that a sentence imposed outside of the range or below the starting point should not be overturned on appeal only because it’s outside of the specified range.

Follow this link for links to the cases discussed and a transcript of the show.