Section Seven of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms

Section 7 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms is a constitutional provision that protects an individual's autonomy and personal legal rights from actions of the government in Canada. There are three types of protection within the section, namely the right to life, liberty, and security of the person. Denials of these rights are constitutional only if the denials do not breach what is referred to as fundamental justice.

This Charter provision provides both substantive and procedural rights. It has broad application beyond merely protecting due process in administrative proceedings and in the adjudicative context, and has in certain circumstances touched upon major national policy issues such as entitlement to social assistance and public health care. As such, it has proven to be a controversial provision in the Charter.

Under the heading of "Legal Rights", the section states:

7. Everyone has the right to life, liberty and security of the person and the right not to be deprived thereof except in accordance with the principles of fundamental justice.

The wording of section 7 says that it applies to "everyone". This includes all people within Canada including non-citizens. It does not, however, apply to corporations.

Section 7 rights can also be violated by the conduct of a party other than a Canadian government body. The government need only be a participant or complicit in the conduct threatening the right, where the violation must be a reasonably foreseeable consequence of the government actions.

Section 7 has not been interpreted to convey positive rights nor has it been interpreted to impose any positive obligations upon the government. The Supreme Court of Canada has not ruled out these alternatives, however.

First, there is the right to life, which stands generally as the basic right to be alive. Life has been thoroughly discussed by the Supreme Court in the 1993 case Rodriguez v. British Columbia (Attorney General). In that case, the Court denied that the section 7 right to bodily control could trump the right to life and thereby justify assisted suicide. As the Court wrote, it was a common societal belief that "human life is sacred or inviolable," and therefore security of the person itself could not include a right to suicide; suicide would destroy life and thus be inherently harmful.

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