Law of Canada

Capstone

Capstone: Nadia Roy and the online craft shop

Nadia Roy is an invented owner of a small online shop in Manitoba that sells craft supplies, including resin and other chemicals, to customers in every province. In one year several things happen. **Province B**, where many of her customers live, passes a law that requires every seller who ships craft chemicals into B to hold a B licence and to use B’s own warning labels. Canada already has federal rules on the labelling and transport of dangerous goods, and the two sets of labels differ. Province B’s licensing board refuses Nadia’s application in a two-line decision that gives no reasons and says only that the application ‘does not meet the criteria’; she had not been told of any complaint. One of her warehouse workers, Samir, is stopped on the street by police, who say that he fits the description of someone seen near a break-in; they search his backpack without a warrant and find a laptop that is not Nadia’s. He is questioned for two hours before he is told that he may call a lawyer. Nadia also dismisses Lucie, an employee of ten years, without cause, paying only the statutory minimum notice under a clause in Lucie’s contract. Finally, her main supplier, Boréal Supplies, told her for weeks that deliveries were on schedule while it was already planning to stop supplying her. You are asked to advise. Use the questions you have learned: which level of government, which right or duty, which standard, and what remedy. The facts are invented and simplified, so state your assumptions.

General education on Canadian law, using invented people and businesses and abstract provinces. It states constitutional provisions and landmark decisions in simplified form, and it is not legal advice. Provinces and territories differ, the law changes, and every case turns on its facts. Consult a lawyer licensed in the province or territory that matters.