Immediate Roadside Prohibitions (IRP) have different consequences for different people depending on where they are in life. If you drive for a living, the worst of it may be the 90-day driving prohibition itself. If you plan to become a lawyer, an IRP on your driving record presents another hurdle. When a law student gets an IRP, the consequences are more than the prohibition itself.
IRPs are not a criminal charge, nor are they an “offence” as we define that in law. The government did something clever when they wrote the IRP law. They claimed that the fine was a “monetary penalty” rather than a fine, and they claimed that the law was intended to be rehabilitative (fixing the bad behaviour) rather than punitive (punishing for bad behaviour) thereby allowing them to call the law “Administrative.”
This gave them a lot of power over how the law is applied. There is a presumption of guilt when you get an IRP. The government gets to make rulings on their law with their own in-house tribunal. The law itself forbids challenging the evidence by way of cross-examination, which means in many cases we can never get to the truth of the matter.
The idea of making IRPs “Administrative” allowed the government to tell the courts that the consequences for people would be short-term and generally limited to addressing the alcohol-driving issue.
When the law was challenged, the lawyers said the intention is short, sharp punishment. The limited inquiry and presumption of guilt were intrinsically connected to the promise that IRPs would not follow people in the future and have long-term consequences for them. When the law was challenged regarding whether it complied with the Charter of Rights, this was how it was explained to the court.
Long-Term IRP consequences
Of course, that’s not how it played out. For many people, there are long-term consequences despite the very limited review provisions and despite the presumption of guilt. One particularly surprising example is when applying to become a lawyer in British Columbia.
In BC the Law Society of British Columbia determines who can become lawyers and they punish lawyers when they break the rules. As such, one must apply to them to become a lawyer upon completing law school and the Law Society gathers evidence about you to build a record on you. On the Application for Admission, the Law Society added the question “have you ever been the subject of any alcohol or drug-related driving prohibitions?”
This question was added after the implementation of the IRP legal scheme, despite it being clear that the intention was that an IRP would not hold you back in life. If you’re a law student and you receive an IRP, you need to know that the IRP is not a short-term issue. It will follow you.
In our view, if the IRP is revoked upon review, there is no obligation to disclose it. It is not likely that an IRP would disallow one from becoming a lawyer – people with criminal records and even people who admitted to crimes while becoming lawyers have been permitted to become lawyers, but the vague concept of “good character” allows the Law Society a great deal of obscure power to make decisions about who becomes a lawyer.
There is no reason for this question if it is not part of their consideration, but it is not clear how it factors into their consideration.
When a law student gets an IRP, the best course of action is to speak to a lawyer right away. If there is an avenue to challenge it, a lawyer who practises driving law is likely to be in a good position to determine whether it is worthwhile to challenge the IRP and to advise about the steps to take in that regard.
When a law student gets an IRP, the consequences are more than just 90-days without driving and a bunch of fines. The IRP creates career hurdles. If you have received an IRP, now is the time to get professional advice. Kyla Lee of our office wrote the book on Immediate Roadside Prohibitions.
Give us a call at 604 685 8889 right away and we can discuss your case.