Torontonians “hold their Charter rights very dear,” Mayor John Tory told reporters hours before Premier Doug Ford said he will override those rights to cut the size of Toronto city council.

“That has been very rarely done in Canada,” Tory said Monday morning when asked about the possibility of Ford using the “notwithstanding clause” to override a court ruling that Ford’s mid-election legislation reducing council to 25 seats is unconstitutional.

“I would really have to ask myself the question, and I think a lot of people would be asking themselves the question, why is it so important to have the changes in place for this election? …

“I think the people of Toronto and the people of Canada hold their Charter rights very dear. I think they understand the importance of those rights in the context of how we live here and our democratic system.

“The notwithstanding clause was put there for very extraordinary circumstances and very extraordinary instances and you have to ask yourself why does this particular change at this time qualify as one of those.”

Tory is expected to make further comment now that Ford has said he intends to use the drastic measure, and will again if courts move to thwart his conservative agenda.

At his news conference, Ford specifically targeted Tory, to whom he lost the 2014 Toronto mayoral election after serving one term as city councillor alongside his late brother Rob, who was mayor from 2010 to 2014.

Ford called Toronto dysfunctional, citing “political gridlock” and accused Tory of saying one thing in public and another behind closed doors. The premier did not elaborate.

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Judge strikes down legislation cutting the size of Toronto council

Judge’s ruling ‘a profound victory’ for democracy, candidates say

The Star revealed July 26 that Ford planned the unprecedented step of shrinking the size of council in the middle of an election. Council, currently 44 wards, had voted to expand to 47 to accommodate population growth downtown and in Willowdale.

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Ford used his majority to get the legislation passed despite pleas from many including Toronto council candidates. Some had quit jobs or moved based on wards in which they had been campaigning since the May 1 start of the election.

The mid-election reduction, Justice Edward Belobaba wrote, “clearly crossed a line” and “substantially interfered with both the candidate’s and the voter’s right to freedom of expression” guaranteed by the Charter and was therefore unconstitutional.

Ford’s council-cut bombshell has political reverberations as well as legal ones.

Tory’s initial response — that Toronto shouldn’t have change “rammed down” its throat, but that provincial legislative powers made a successful court challenge unlikely — triggered criticism that he was not standing up for Toronto against Ford.

Rather than a court fight, Tory — who had wanted the size of council to remain 44 seats — proposed the province hold a binding referendum asking Torontonians how many wards the city should have.

His response prompted Jennifer Keesmaat, the former chief city planner, to register to run for mayor against Tory, saying he is unable or unwilling to fight Ford in Toronto’s interests.

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On Monday, in response to the court ruling, Keesmaat tweeted: “When the chips were down, John Tory didn’t have our city’s back, and this entire episode has shown us we need new leadership at City Hall — leadership that will stand up for Toronto when it matters most.”

Tory rejected that at his news conference, noting that he gathered legal experts to hear opinions about a court challenge and later voted with city council to take the province to court. Those moves happened after Keesmaat’s surprise entry into the mayoral fray.

47 wards vs. 25

“My objective in this relationship is not to prove who can throw how many stones the hardest or who can make the loudest and most boisterous statements or even suggest crazy ideas like secession,” Tory said.

“My objective is to make sure we build a relationship in which I do my job which is to stand up for Toronto, which I believe I’ve done in this instance and other instances and I will continue to do going forward … I will take a positive attitude forward to relationship-building moving, the city forward as I have done in my first four years here.”

David Rider is the Star’s City Hall bureau chief and a reporter covering Toronto politics. Follow him on Twitter: @dmrider

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