Canada

Ontario Premier Doug Ford is threatening to use the notwithstanding clause to override a judge's decision that blocks his government from slashing the size of Toronto city council nearly in half.

The dramatic step would make Ford the first Ontario premier to ever use the clause, which allows government to create laws that operate in spite of certain charter rights that the laws appear to violate. He also threatened to use the clause again in the future, but didn't provide any specifics.

"We're taking a stand," Ford told reporters at a 2 p.m. news conference.

"The result is unacceptable."

In an unprecedented and scathing decision, Justice Edward Belobaba ruled Monday that Ford's Progressive Conservative government "clearly crossed the line" with its Better Local Government Act, which aligns municipal ward boundaries with provincial ridings, cutting the potential number of councillors from 47 to 25 after the Oct. 22 election.

In his highly anticipated ruling, Belobaba calls the act "unconstitutional."

Doug Ford is turning something that he didn't run on, that serves no urgent purpose, that his base wasn't clamouring for, and that seems to be based mostly on personal beefs from his days as a municipal politician into his defining issue as premier.