A growing group of challengers is amassing to fight Premier Doug Ford’s cuts to Toronto council in a legal battle with a looming deadline — the scheduled Oct. 22 election day.

Until the case is heard, and likely appeals are launched, it’s unclear if Bill 5, the Better Local Government Act, will be struck down or how many wards, 47 or 25, will be in play for this election. The legal case also makes it uncertain whether the election will be postponed.

A Superior Court judge on Tuesday morning refused to push back the date for hearing the legal challenges, noting the case’s “importance to the community” and “pressing” need to be heard without delay as the election campaign resumed this week under a 25-ward structure.

Nearly a dozen lawyers appeared before Justice Edward Belobaba at Osgoode Hall to deal with outstanding scheduling issues a day after council directed the city’s legal team to fight Bill 5 in court.

Belobaba will be responsible for hearing their arguments later this month, the lawyers learned in court after they arrived.

The legal challenges were launched after Premier Doug Ford announced July 27 that his government would be unilaterally cutting the size of council from 47 to 25 wards for the upcoming Oct. 22 election without warning or consultation.

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The issue was first heard in court on Aug. 14 after lawyer and council candidate Rocco Achampong filed a notice of application seeking an injunction, which would have essentially blocked the new legislation from taking effect until arguments against it could be heard. The bill received royal assent the same day. A hearing date of Aug. 31 was set last week, skipping the injunction step and going straight to a hearing of the arguments.

After council gave them direction to do so, city lawyers will now also file an application against the province.

Also fighting the legislation is a group of three diverse residents represented by Goldblatt Partners. They are Chris Moise, a downtown candidate in the 47-ward election in the area including the Gay Village who intends to withdraw from a 25-ward election; resident and elector Ish Aderonmu; and Prabha Khosla from the Women Win TO organization that works to see more women represented on council.

Five residents represented by Paliare Roland intend to be intervenors in the case. They are candidates Lily Cheng, Jennifer Hollett and Dyanoosh Youssefi along with Sue Dexter from the Harbord Village Residents’ Association and Geoff Kettel from the Leaside Property Owners’ Association and the Federation of North Toronto Residents’ Associations.

The Canadian Taxpayers Federation also plans to be an intervener, which means acting as a non-party who can submit materials to assist the court.

The province’s lawyer Robin Basu said he may have trouble responding to what is now an “avalanche” of materials from all those involved, borrowing a description from Justice Belobaba. Basu said the province’s case could be “severely prejudiced” if they are forced to go ahead on Aug. 31 as scheduled.

The city’s lawyer, Glenn Chu, argued they were all only there because of the province, which changed the rules mid-election when the election date was already fixed, and that the province should have known the timelines would be tight.

Moving the hearing date beyond Aug. 31 would mean a decision may not even be made before the new nomination period closes on Sept. 14, Chu said.

“I’m not going to change the Aug. 31 date,” Belobaba concluded before dismissing the large group of lawyers from the room.

Belobaba said if some “bombshell” were to arise that could merit the province needing an extra day or two at most, the lawyers could contact him directly. But he warned it would be “highly unlikely” he would allow it.

The judge also indicated he believes there are already some arguments that can be dismissed.

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“There are some arguments in this case that may be liable, there are some that are definitely not liable,” he said.

How this case will proceed through the courts — and how quickly — is uncertain.

Already, it has been expedited to have Belobaba hear the case on its merits on Aug. 31. He will consider whether the legislation is unconstitutional and should be in force for this or any future election.

Lawyers will now exchange factums and other documents laying out their cases before the Aug. 31 hearing. After that the judge could choose to give his decision orally first with written reasons to follow or wait to issue a written decision.

At that point any of the parties could appeal the decision to the Court of Appeal, which must first agree that the appeal should be heard. In the meantime, the Court of Appeal could be asked to consider an injunction. That court could ultimately uphold Belobaba’s decision, change it or reverse it.

What do you think?

On Monday, council gave its legal team direction to seek a postponement of the election date if required. The city’s team was also instructed to pursue any and all appeals or defend the city in them.

A Court of Appeal decision can be appealed to the Supreme Court of Canada, which must also agree to hear the appeal. Because the Supreme Court only hears a limited number of standout cases of public importance, on questions of law or national significance, the Court of Appeal is a last resort for most cases.

It could take a substantial amount of time for the case to exhaust all legal avenues if appeals are pursued, putting the process at odds with the current election date of Oct. 22.

“The issues are important enough in the abstract” to go to the Supreme Court, said York University Osgoode Hall Law School professor Bruce Ryder. But that kind of appeal will take years, he said, meaning a 2018 election would be moot during that appeal.

It’s unclear if an appeal to the Court of Appeal could be accommodated in time for there to be a decision before an Oct. 22 election date, he said, and is impossible to predict.

Ryder called this case “unprecedented” in part because of the province’s interference in an election midway through.

If the outcome of the case is only ultimately decided after the Oct. 22 election, once all appeals have been exhausted, it’s unlikely it would have any retroactive impact on that election, said Lorraine Weinrib, constitutional law professor at the University of Toronto.

“I can’t see an invalidation of an election. The election would have taken place under the then-law,” she said.