Last week, the Court of Appeal heard GAJE’s appeal of the September 2024 decision of the Divisional Court that threw our case out of court, reversing the decision of Judge Eugenia Papageorgiou the year before in August 2023, that had determined our application should proceed to a full hearing on its merits.
The Court of Appeal consisted of three judges: Eileen Gillesse, Sarah Pepall and Lois Roberts. The judges were engaged throughout the hearing, asking clarifying questions of both sides.
Our legal team – Jillian Siskind and Lawrence Greenspon – was superb. They established an excellent rapport with the judges from the very outset, speaking confidently in command of the material and respectfully in responding to the judges’ questions.
Our lawyers divided their arguments into two parts. The first was more overarching, explaining the full theory and legal basis of our appeal and emphasizing that GAJE was not seeking a ruling at this time on the merits of our request to have the Adler decision of 1996 reassessed. The team meticulously explained that the material they had filed and on which they presented argument was intended to show that there were sufficient legal and societal developments since Adler was decided, nearly 30 years ago, to trigger the test that would warrant sending our application to a hearing on the merits. The team emphasized the principle that the Constitution of Canada is a “living tree” that must not be frozen in time.
The second part of the GAJE presentation presented the legal developments and the societal changes since 1996. These post-1996 developments were instrumental, our lawyers stated, in justifying a new examination by the courts at how the Charter of Rights and Freedoms might be applied to them in 2025. Indeed, in her decision of 2023, Judge Papageorgiou did precisely that. She gathered into one basket, all of the new legal and societal developments since 1996 and determined their cumulative impact did warrant a fresh look at the constitutional issues that GAJE had brought for adjudication.
In response to GAJE’s arguments, the government lawyers made the very same arguments that they have since the very beginning, although last week a bit more volubly. The Adler case has decided the matter, they proclaimed. There is nothing new in our application, they maintained. The GAJE material, they said, provides no new evidence that “fundamentally changes the parameters of the legal debate.” He emphasized the word “fundamentally” as the key requirement of the legal principle that must be satisfied to trigger the application of the rule allowing a hearing to argue for the reassessment of the 1996 decision. At one point in response to a question from one of the judges, the government summarized his view of our case in starkly absolute terms: “Zero plus zero plus zero equals zero.”
GAJE’s legal team was powerful in reply to the government’s arguments. They held the attention of the three judges and continued to steer them to reflecting upon the context of the original 1867 “historical compromise” that resulted in the S. 30 enshrinement in the Constitution of Canada of the mutual minority protections – by means of the respective educational systems – in Quebec and Ontario at that time. The team urged the judges to view the S. 30 protection for what it was intended to achieve then, and how those circumstances some 150 years ago, should not prevent the application of the equality and freedom of religion provisions of the Charter from being applied in educational matters today. This is especially so because reconsidering the application of our Charter rights today, some 30 years after Adler, would not negatively affect the Catholic community in Ontario.
The Court reserved its decision. Once it is handed down, GAJE will share it at our first opportunity. If the ruling is positive, GAJE gains the opportunity to present our full case, at long last. Let us hope.
GAJE is very proud of and grateful to our legal team.
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If you wish to contribute to GAJE’s lawsuit, please click here. Charitable receipts for donations for income tax purposes will be issued by Mizrachi Canada. Your donations will be used for the sole purpose of helping to underwrite the costs of the lawsuit. For further information, please contact Israel Mida at: imida1818@gmail.com Thank you, in advance, for doing so.
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Shabbat shalom
Am Yisrael Chai
Grassroots for Affordable Jewish Education (GAJE)
November 28, 2025
Grassroots for Affordable Jewish Education 