Our Plaintiffs believe that the sacrifice of Canada’s sovereignty to a foreign state is wrong. Canadians can support Plaintiffs Ginny, Gwen, and Kazia by being a Witness in our FATCA IGA lawsuit. — If interested contact me at Stephen.Kish.Chair@adcs-adsc.ca
Plaintiffs Ginny and Gwen now have a new Plaintiff in our Canadian FATCA IGA lawsuit:
Her name is Kazia Highton, lives in British Columbia, and like Ginny and Gwen, left the United States at an early age. All of our Plaintiffs happen to be strong-minded women….
As some of you know, it takes a very special courage to be a Plaintiff in a Canadian lawsuit. We welcome Kazia to the litigation and to our supporters — and thank her for acting on behalf of ALL Canadians — most of whom will never know of, or appreciate, her actions today.
I hope that you will understand that I cannot disclose the specifics regarding the strategic reasons why our litigators felt that it was important to select Kazia as a Plaintiff.
The Amended Statement of Claim is pretty much identical to the original Statement of Claim, the difference being the addition of a new Plaintiff. However, you might notice that some statements on “sovereignty” are beefed up somewhat. We now state for example: “The distinction created by the Impugned Provisions causes the Plaintiffs disadvantage, including but not limited to the facts that the Plaintiffs: a. are denied the protection of Canadian sovereignty…“.
For all of us, sovereignty is a very important and obvious Claim. Previously, Canada was a sovereign nation until it gave up that sovereignty because of fear of economic harm promised by the United States — if it did not comply with the FATCA “agreement”.
To remind you, our Claim is that the FATCA IGA enabling legislation violates the Constitution Act of 1867, including “… the principle that Canada will not forfeit its sovereignty to a foreign state”, and Sections 7, 8, and 15 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.
Once the Witnesses have been selected and their affidavits submitted to the Federal Court, I will have another update. Thank you for your support and for your investment in this lawsuit.
THERE IS STILL TIME TO INCLUDE NEW WITNESSES IN THE LITIGATION. If interested, contact me at: Stephen.Kish.Chair@adcs-adsc.ca
@admin
Sorry, can you switch this comment to media and blog? Thanks
heidi,
If you put your comment in the media blog, I will remove it from this thread. Thanks.
Thanks Kazia for helping out all US citizens from all over the world! We are all hoping for a win in Canada so that our governments wake up and realize what the US government is doing to us. This is wonderful news and we will be routing on team Canada from every corner of the globe. Thanks to our wonderful leaders…Stephen, John, Trisha, Lynn, Gwen, Ginny and Kazia ! You are truly inspirational and a flame of hope
@ 2terrified2sleep
… and Carol … and of course Joe Arvay and his legal team. Bless ’em all for what they have done and are continuing to do to advance the legal action against FATCA and its implementation in Canada.
Thank you Kazia!
With regard to the Brexit outcome, any future legal challenges in the UK or the EU will now have to be two separate lawsuits – one for the UK and the other for the remaining EU.
@Don
I’m surprised people haven’t had more to say about Brexit here on this blog. Not only will it indeed result in separate lawsuits being needed for the UK and the EU, it has also put the famously US tainted Boris Johnson first in line to become the UK’s new PM.
Actually it looks like it is being discussed in the “FATCA and the United Kingdom” thread:
It is an old thread so it doesn’t appear near the top of the blog so I didn’t see it at first.
Dash I have been the sole person commenting and I am very pleased having voted leave. Brexit the movie convinced me there would be no joy on fatca via Brussels
@George
“Churchill would be proud.” Do you agree?
https://pjmedia.com/diaryofamadvoter/2016/06/23/brexit-vote-has-huge-ramifications-for-us-politics/
Maybe sovereignty IS important.
Re: Brexit and UK — Marni Soupcoff, a reporter for Canada’s National Post, who has variably supported our cause, today concludes the following.
Is her statement accurate?:
She says:
Sound familiar?
Will Canadians really “rise up” and trash the FATCA “agreement” between U.S. and Canada that gave away our sovereignty?
You can read and comment at:”
http://news.nationalpost.com/full-comment/marni-soupcoff-brexit-is-about-autonomy-and-overbearing-bureaucracy-not-chauvinism-or-bigotry
I confess I am an outsider to the UK and probably very naive about all of this and don’t understand many of the economic implications but I see Brexit as the first shot against multi-national corporations, big banks and the elites that now run our countries, the media etc. There may be some chaos but true democracy seems worth it.
@ Cheryl
I’d like to think that as well. I just don’t know if the future repercussions were fully detailed before the vote. What I did like was the voter turnout. That was impressive. I can understand the Leaver’s position with respect to sovereignty, and I can see how I might support that if I lived there. One of the issues as I see it, is we do live in a global trade world. Pulling away from that for Great Britain may have consequences.
But it apparently will take a couple or few years for them to negotiate and sort out the details, so I remain hopeful. But slim margin votes rarely offer solace and as we have seen elsewhere often result in great and long lasting divisions in a country and take far longer to heal than a one topic platform.
But fascinating to watch. The Brits woke up this morning to a surprise- it was too close to call. Which makes me wonder what will happen in the US elections this fall. Have they eliminated hanging chads by chance? I have forgotten if that is the right term and I don’t even want to tell you what that reminded me of the first time I heard it.
I like being an observer. It’s so much easier than being in the thick of things. The remaining brain cells I have left seem to focus mainly on our law suit and I am content with that.
I have been smiling so hard the last few days telling everyone Gwen and I have found our triplet sister. We were never sure we would and it is grand and a huge relief to share this litigation joy? with one more person.
Some Ph.D student might want to analyze why the three plaintiffs are females. I leave that to them. But I think there may be a story behind that. I know I have my own. And I don’t regret it at all as crazy as that may sound. I have lost count of good friends and others who asked me if I realized what I have really done. I suspect there are many people in the UK who are also being asked that same question today. Sometimes, you just have to take that step out of the shadows, despite the reported consequences and as long as you can live with that step, you will be fine. That’s my view and experience anyway.
I suspect you are more than an observer Canadian Ginny but I agree with you and am grateful for you and Gwen and now Kazia. Your strength and generosity…your humanity shines through. We need more of that these days. Thank you all.
“I see Brexit as the first shot against multi-national corporations, big banks and the elites that now run our countries, the media etc. There may be some chaos but true democracy seems worth it.”
I think so too. Even though I personally would have supported Remain if I were British, I support democracy more. Cameron helped bring democracy to England. Why would anyone want him to leave? The English[*] people have spoken. People should be happy if Cameron stays on and brings them more improvements in democracy.
[* The Scottish people spoke earlier, but that was in a UK that was different from today’s UK. The Scottish people will have another opportunity to speak, and they will try to join the EU. The remainder will be English people, who most heavily favoured Leave. Cameron is an excellent leader, helping to bring self determination to so many people.]
Hmm, since I’m known for irony, I’d better emphasize that the preceding comment was not ironic. It reads well either way, but I really meant it, Cameron helped bring democracy to England.
We will see what happens in the future. Will there be more shots. Will the power bases pay attention to the serious discontent that abounds before it’s too late. I do think you give too much credit to Cameron though. This was not as I see it an altruistic effort to give the British people a day. It was cynical, political machinations to remain in power. Same old, same old.
OK, I agree that Cameron’s intentions differed from his accomplishment, and his intentions were the same old. Nonetheless his accomplishment deserves respect. The voters were the British people, the English people got what they wanted, and the Scottish people will have another opportunity to get what they want. Maybe Northern Ireland will get another chance too.
By the way, Pierre Trudeau’s reason for patriating the constitution was also same old, same old to distract people from his gross mismanagement of the economy. That Charter has turned out to be important, but originally it was intended as a cynical, political machination to remain in power.
Well, we’ll just have to see where it all ends up. I’m afraid I wouldn’t trust any of the politicians motives but maybe something good will come of it.
So, how is it that Panama can announce, with US consent; ” The start of automatic Exchange of information willl be extended September 2015 to 30 September 2016.” ?
http://www.anorco.com/en/news/1-noticia-1
AND,
the reason given for the delay is “the issue of RECIPROCITY”;
“The Signing of the IGA agreement, which will allow financial institutions in Panama to report the General Directorate of revenue (DGI) and not directly to the service of revenue internal of the United States (IRS), has been delayed by difference in translation, specifically on the issue of reciprocity.”
How is it that Canada jumped so eagerly to bend over for the US, and smaller Panama has held out and gotten a delay to September 2016, on whatever grounds? The Canadian CRA rushed to turnover Canadian taxpayer account data to the IRS despite the ADCS valiant attempt to obtain an injunction.
And, what kind of RECIPROCITY is at stake between Panama and the US? As we know, any US ‘reciprocity’ in the IGAs is at best ‘aspirational’ ( see references in papers by Prof. Allison Christians as cited here http://isaacbrocksociety.ca/2013/09/20/from-us-treasury-myth-vs-fatca/comment-page-9/#comment-594976 ).
How is it that the CRA claimed that no basis was available for Canada to delay the September 2015 turnover of Canadian citizen and resident taxpayer data to the US Treasury , and the ADCS request for an injunction was denied https://adcsovereignty.wordpress.com/2015/09/30/plaintiffs-giny-and-gwen-are-denied-injunction-pending-summary-trial-appeal/ , but yet Panama has still not complied? AND, lo and behold, despite the delay obtained or given to Panama, and despite the Panama papers, the US still hasn’t blown up the Panamanian financial sector with their US FATCA witholding financial weapon of mass destruction as our Canadian FATCAnatics in Parliament claimed was an imminent threat (Harper and his CONS) and which is now defended using our own Canadian taxpayer dollars (courtesy of Sunny boy Trudeau and his now turncoat fibbin LIBs – even the ones that ably fought the IGA and proposed amendments to it, now fib and claim that it was only “the process” that the Libs objected to https://openparliament.ca/committees/ethics/42-1/8/diane-lebouthillier-7/ https://openparliament.ca/committees/ethics/42-1/8/diane-lebouthillier-9/ ). Lebouthillier says it was the ‘splainin’ that was deficient, not the IGA and legislation itself ( “…We would have taken the time to explain clearly to Canadians and to Parliament why the agreement was being adopted………”) though she and her fellow Lib MPs know full well that WE who corresponded with them (and some of us spoke to MPs directly) were the ones who needed no ‘splainin’, as we were the ones clearly demonstrating to them what the IGA would do to harm Canadians and Canadian sovereignty.
The Revenue Minister appears to be stonewalling my request as to whether my banking info has been handed over to the IRS via the CRA. The CRA has complied with the request via the RM’s office, but the response to me has held up at the RM’s office for about 6 weeks now.
The CRA is looking into it now.
@Bubblebustin, thanks for pursuing that and for keeping us updated. It’s very interesting. Should be straightforward shouldn’t it? Whether – Yes or No. What might have taken longer. You are the taxpayer, so no privacy breach. CRA has complied. So, what is Ms. Lebouthillier’s RM office problem with it? She told us all that Canadian taxpayers like you are protected https://openparliament.ca/committees/ethics/42-1/8/diane-lebouthillier-8/ . The Revenue Minister assured Canadians – via Parliament, that re the FATCA IGA the Liberals would have been different from the CONS; “…….We would have taken the time to discuss it in a much more open and transparent manner in order to provide parliamentarians and Canadians with all the information, as is right and proper.” https://openparliament.ca/committees/ethics/42-1/8/diane-lebouthillier-7/
She also said; “….We would have worked differently by involving all parliamentarians in open and transparent discussions and by providing information that was fair and equitable for all Canadians. ”
https://openparliament.ca/committees/ethics/42-1/8/diane-lebouthillier-10/
So, where is that “open and transparent manner” with ” all the information, as is right and proper” in a “fair and equitable” process and manner now eh?
What would be interesting is a FOIA request to obtain all emails and memos going back and forth from the CRA, the Minister and Ministry of Revenue, and anyone else in the government re your request, and re the reasons for the delay and the run around.
Maybe we should mount a campaign to all ask the CRA whether our banking info went to the IRS, whether we are or are not a USreportableCanadianperson, flood them with requests, and see what they do….. And if there is a delay, we could all file FOIA requests too.
If you want a hit list get some IT guy in a major bank to get the data. There must be one anti-FATCA IT guy somewhere in Canada even if it arrives anonymously in the post on a SD card.
Badger: I hope Mr. Arvay will consider the excellent points in your comment re: Panama. Canada fell all over itself in its rush to do obeisance to the US on FATCA when there was no need to do so. As a result Canadian citizens’ privacy has been compromised for almost an entire year already while Panamanians have had another year’s grace.