The "Golden Rule" allows a judge to dismiss the ordinary sense of a word or expression in the interests of a coherent interpretation of the law as a whole. [Côté, at page 270.][1]
Context of the Statute as a Whole
206 The principles applicable to the interpretation of statutes as a whole have been summarized as follows:
[T]he elementary rule must be observed that no one should profess to understand any part of a statute or of any other document before he had read the whole of it. Until he has done so he is not entitled to say that it or any part of it is clear and unambiguous. [Attorney-General v. Prince Ernest Augustus of Hanover, [1957] A.C. 436 (H.L.), at p. 463.]
[T]he office of a good expositor of an Act of Parliament is to make construction on all the parts together, and not of one part only by itself ; nemo enim aliquam partem recte intelligere possit, antequam totum iterum atque iterum perlegerit . . . and so before this time have other statutes been expounded by the ancient Judges and sages of the law. [Lincoln College's Case (1595), 3 Co. Rep. 58b, 76 E.R. 764, at p. 767.] [Emphasis added.]
207 The nemo enim aliquam partem recte intelligere possit, antequam totum iterum atque iterum perlegerit rule literally means: no one can understand a part before reading and rereading the whole in full. This rule has been part of the common law for over 400 years and has been codified in Quebec, as far as contracts are concerned, by art. 1427 of the Civil Code of Québec, S.Q. 1991, c. 64 (formerly art. 1018 of the Civil Code of Lower Canada). It is thus necessary to read and reread the entire statute in full before deciding how the term in question should be defined. If necessary in order to properly understand the scheme of the statute, the regulations made thereunder must also be read and reread. The justification behind the nemo intelligere possit antequam iterum perlegerit rule is as follows. It must be assumed that the statute is coherent. The principle of internal statutory coherence has been recognized by the common law since the 17th century: Chamberlain's Case (1611), Lane 117, 145 E.R. 346, at p. 347 (Tanfield J.):
. . . the meaning of an act of parliament ought to be expounded by an examination of the intention of the makers thereof, collected out of all the causes thes therein, so that there be no repugnancy, but a concordancy in all the parts thereof. . . . [Emphasis added.]
208 I note that the modern expression of the internal coherence principle, which has been part of our law since it was reformulated by Lord Atkinson in City of Victoria v. Bishop of Vancouver Island, [1921] 2 A.C. 384 (P.C.), at p. 388, was adopted again by this Court in The King v. Assessors of the Town of Sunny Brae, [1952] 2 S.C.R. 76, at p. 97:
In my opinion, the construction of a statute which produces such anomalies is contrary to well settled canons of construction.
A statute is to be construed, if at all possible, "so that there may be no repugnancy or inconsistency between its portions or members". . . . [Emphasis added.]
To what extent the contextual approach is necessary will be clear from the following. Entire interpretation can be put to jeopardy if the approach is not adhered to strictly. In this case Lord Hoffmann observed:
“I do not think that this question should be answered by examining these provisions in isolation, without regard to the overall context in which they were enacted. In isolation section 10(1)(b) and (2)(b) might be thought to leave it to the option of the Secretary of State to accept or to repudiate liability as he pleases :
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If that were so, there would be much to be said for the view that these provisions were procedural in character because they enabled the Secretary of State to remove a claim which was otherwise actionable in law from the jurisdiction of the courts. Viewed in the overall context however these provisions can be seen to have an entirely different function which impresses them firmly with the character of substantive law.[2]”.
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