Legal Research

Ontario Clothesline Bans Banned

By Simon Fodden

A legal low-tech note for a Friday — which is still law and technology and, so, fit meat for Slaw:

The Premier of Ontario will announce today that a regulation taking effect immediately will undo any existing bans on the use of clotheslines by homeowners and preclude any such bans in the future. The regulation, which hasn’t yet made it to the e-laws site, is made pursuant to the Energy Conservation Leadership Act, 2006, S.O. 2006, c.3, Schedule A:

s.3(2) A person is permitted to use designated goods, services and technologies in such circumstances as may be prescribed, despite any restriction imposed at law that would otherwise prevent or restrict their use, including a restriction established by a municipal by-law, a condominium by-law, an encumbrance on real property or an agreement.
(3) A restriction imposed at law that would otherwise prevent or restrict the use of designated goods, services or technologies is inoperative.

Gotta love that “inoperative.” And, as far as I’m concerned, gotta hate that tendentious title… “Conservation Leadership…” This use of statute names to force people to speak words that would not otherwise cross their lips, started as I recall by the Harris government here, annoys me greatly and is reminiscent of the clumsy propaganda of communist states.

But what I really love — smug, superior Schadenfreude I freely confess — is the direct attack on the petty bourgeois pieties that restrictive covenants impose on some developments. Let it all hang out.

Full post as published by Slaw.ca on April 18, 2008 (boomark / email).