On March 18, 2026, the Ontario Court of Appeal ruled 3-0 against the Christian Heritage Party (CHP) in its case against the City of Hamilton. The case concerned a CHP advertisement stating: “Women: An Adult Female” along with party’s name, website, and the tagline “Bringing Respect for Life and Truth to Canadian Politics”.

The City would not allow the CHP to run this ad in designated advertising spaces on the City’s transit system.

ARPA Canada intervened in the appeal hearing as a friend of the Court. ARPA made submissions to the court regarding the importance of freedom of expression in the debate around questions of sex and gender. ARPA written argument are available here.

The City’s decision is subject to the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, which requires that any government-imposed limit on freedom of expression be “demonstrably justified in a free and democratic society.”

ARPA respectfully disagrees with the Court of Appeal that the limit on expression was justified in this case.

Reasonably anticipated harms?

The Court reasoned that the City’s decision is justified based on the reasonably anticipated harm the Ad would cause to transgender persons. “However, the Court’s reasons seem sparse on this point,” notes John Sikkema, ARPA’s legal counsel and Director of Law and Policy.

At one point (para 64), the Court notes, “While ARPA argues that this evidence was insufficient to support the conclusions reached by the City, the City’s analysis is entitled to deference.” The Court goes on to say that it was not unreasonable for the City to engage in the research it engaged in, namely consulting: police data on hate incidents, a study on negative depictions of transgender persons in media, and the opinion of the City’s LGBTQ advisory committee.

Sikkema comments, “That the City is entitled to some degree of deference is not directly responsive to ARPA’s specific arguments for why the evidence relied on by the City could not support its conclusion that the Ad would likely cause real harm.”

“The decision does not explain how an ad asserting that women are female could lead to more hate crimes, or how the ad is comparable to insulting depictions of transgender persons in media, since the ad does not depict a transgender person,” Sikkema notes.

Relying on an LGBTQ advisory committee opinion

“As for the City’s LGBTQ advisory committee, these are unnamed persons offering an opinion on the harm they think the Ad would cause. I think there is a serious question about whether this should be accorded much or any weight.”

At several crucial points in its reasoning, the Court concludes that the City is owed deference.  

“I think there’s an important discussion to have around whether the way Charter rights are adjudicated in the administrative law context really upholds the demonstrable justification standard for limiting rights that the Charter requires,” Sikkema concludes.

The silver lining

“The silver lining here is that the Court did not endorse the argument, presented by EGALE, that the speech in question was discriminatory or hateful per se,” Sikkema says.

“The Court did well to clarify that the ad’s inconsistency with City policies and their position on gender identity alone does not justify censorship,” Sikkema explains. “The Court also rightly noted avoiding offending people is no justification for censorship.”

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ARPA Canada is a Reformed Christian advocacy organization and experienced friend of the court in constitutional cases.

For further comment or interviews, please contact John Sikkema at 1-866-691-2772 or at john@arpacanada.ca