New Federal Court of Appeal Chief Justice Pierre Blais in his Ottawa chambers overlooking his former Parliament Hill stomping grounds.  [Photo by Cristin Schmitz for The Lawyers Weekly] Click here to see full sized version.

Newly-minted Federal Court of Appeal Chief Justice Pierre Blais doesn’t deny that his extensive political experience played a role in his ascent up the judicial ladder.

But the affable and energetic 60-year-old ex-cabinet minister, who regularly plays tennis with people half his age and writes thrillers in his off-hours, doesn’t apologize for his former political life either.

“I am very proud of my resume frankly,” says the chief justice, who held the Agriculture, Solicitor General, Consumer and Corporate Affairs and Justice portfolios during nearly seven years in the Progressive Conservative cabinets of Brian Mulroney and Kim Campbell.

“I was appointed [to the Federal Court] by Mr. Chretien [a Liberal], and I have been elevated [to the Federal Court of Appeal] by Mr. Harper [a Conservative], so if it’s a patronage issue — what should I be?” the chief justice asked The Lawyers Weekly.

“Should we ask all lawyers in Canada not to be politically involved in their lives?” he queried during an exclusive Nov. 13 interview at his chambers overlooking his former stomping grounds on Parliament Hill.

“I think it’s an important part of your life to be allowed to have a life before [the Bench] — whatever you do,” he explained. “Courts should be open to all minds as well, and I don’t think that someone who has been engaged in politics should be disqualified by that. Why? I think the experience I had, and the knowledge from the government machinery was, and is still, very helpful for me to understand the decision-making process — because we are dealing with that [at the court] on a daily basis. There are federal government employees making decisions and we are dealing with those decisions — [determining] whether they are right or wrong — and knowing how the system works from the inside” helps.

Asked point-blank if he considers political patronage to be why Justice Minister Rob Nicholson appointed him to lead the Federal Court of Appeal Sept. 9, Chief Justice Blais responds with equal directness.

“Well, I don’t think so,” he replies. “I think I was appointed chief justice — you should ask the [justice] minister — but I think because I was the best candidate available on the short list.”

“What can I say on that?” he adds. “You know any judge in this country has been appointed through a political process so I passed a [vetting] committee. I think I was ‘recommended’ [since] I was appointed by Mr. Chretien,... and later on another Prime Minister [Harper] asked me to preside over the Court of Appeal. What can I say? Should I say ‘Oh well, go to someone else. You know I have a political background. I don’t think I should be there.’ That’s not the way [I think]. I thought I would be able to do something.”

Getting things done — with characteristic energy and passion — is a hallmark of Chief Justice Blais’ life and career — although he hasn’t pursued his profession in a showy or self-aggrandizing way.

Known as a “no-maintenance” (as opposed to low- or high-maintenance) trial judge during his decade at the Federal Court, Chief Justice Blais carried an above-average caseload.

He has long aspired to do appellate work and continues to be strongly interested in national security matters. Designated to hear national security cases at the Federal Court, in 2008 he landed a three-month fellowship at the Institute of Advanced Legal Studies at the University of London with a winning proposal to research the treatment of sensitive national security evidence by the English and Canadian courts.

A member of both the Quebec and Ontario Bars, the chief justice graduated in law from Laval University and practised in Montmagny, Que. with Morin Lemieux Blais from 1977 to 1984. During those years he also lectured on business law and other subjects at Laval.

He was elected in 1984 as the MP for Bellechasse. After the Progressive Conservatives were all but wiped out in 1993, he practised as a partner for five years with Quebec’s Langlois, Robert before joining the Federal Court in 1998.

When he was publicly sworn in as chief justice last month, Chief Justice Blais’ attracted the headline “I won’t give orders to government” in the Ottawa Citizen where he was quoted as saying “I see my duties, my responsibilities as a judge, not to create legislation, not to change legislation, not to tell government what direction to take, not at all. I think that our duty is to tell the parties before us — sometimes government — not always, but sometimes — if they are right or wrong in what they have done.”

Chief Justice Blais doesn’t back away from those remarks, but he does eschew the “deferential judge” label. “My approach is that I get to the Bench… after being well-informed about the case, and I am listening, and after that we [on the panel] make a decision,” he says. “I am rejecting the tagging approach. I should be open to everybody, to any idea, and make the decision on the file.”

As for his goals as chief justice, he does not profess a grand plan. During his swearing-in, he called on the government to speedily fill the court’s two vacancies. “In my speech, I told the [justice] minister in public, with 200 witnesses, that we need judges. I think they are looking at this,” he said.

He emphasizes “those posts have to be filled. Also we need to have bilingual judges because we are sitting in both official languages and also in both jurisdictions, and sometimes mixed. Our [Federal] courts are the only ones where you have common law and civil [law] at the same time, sometimes in the same file.”

Chief Justice Blais says what he wants to do is carry on with the practical aim of his predecessor, retired Chief Justice John Richard (a former president of the Ontario Liberal party), to provide good service to the public.

“I don’t have a five-year plan,” remarks the chief justice. “What I want is to offer the best service [to the public] and to make sure that the best judges are around me. So I work on training, I work on making sure that the court will provide the service that… people are entitled to, because people are entitled to have good service from the court.”

As for realizing the Federal Court’s and Federal Court of Appeal’s decades-old, but frustrated, dream of building a grand national headquarters on “Justice Square” beside the Supreme Court of Canada in Ottawa, Chief Justice Blais doesn’t hold out such ambitions in the present depressed economic climate (ironically, when he was a cabinet minister he announced the edifice would be built, but the multi-million dollar project was shelved).

“I don’t need a monument,” observes Chief Justice Blais. “I will work hard from early in the morning to the evening doing my best. What I would like to do is to be seen as a court that has a free mind, an open mind and making decisions on the record that is before us. My objectives are very pragmatic ones. Our future will be decided by the [needs of the] people who are coming to us.”