Policy of the Minister of Justice

1 April 2014

1. PURPOSE

Prepared pursuant to section 2 of the Act respecting the Compilation of Québec Laws and Regulations (chapter R-2.2.0.0.2), this policy describes the various rules applied by the Service de refonte et de mise à jour des lois et des règlements in its updating operations.

2. RULES FOR INCLUSION IN THE COMPILATION OF QUÉBEC LAWS AND REGULATIONS

The Compilation contains normative texts in force. Once a statute has been enacted by the National Assembly and received assent by the Lieutenant Governor, or a regulation has been made or approved by the Government or other competent authority, it will be included in the Compilation only if the enactment is in force, either wholly or partially.

Normative texts of a general and permanent nature or in current use form part of the Compilation, which consequently contains all Acts of public interest. The Regulations Act (chapter R-18.1) is used by the Minister as the basis for determining which texts should be included in the Compilation, although other texts of a regulatory nature or of public interest but not wholly or partially subject to the Regulations Act may be included as well. The Compilation many also contain certain statutes and regulations of a local nature and widespread use, such as the charters of the cities of Gatineau, Lévis, Longueuil, Montréal and Québec. Lastly, the Compilation contains the Civil Code and the Act respecting the implementation of the reform of the Civil Code.

Texts of a purely local or private nature or affecting specific groups or persons or a particular area of land, but which have no significant consequences for the general population, are not included, such as statutes dealing with certain pension plans. The same applies to texts having short-lived purposes or consequences, or whose purpose will be achieved within a short time, as is the case for appropriations Acts.

The inclusion or exclusion of normative texts in the Compilation has no effect on their coming into force or currency.

3. RULES OF IDENTIFCATION AND CLASSIFICATION OF LAWS AND REGULATIONS

The alphanumerical classification system established in 1977 continues to apply.

Legislation

Statutes are identified and classed according to the first letter of the main subject in the French title, followed by a number denoting the title's position in a predetermined alphabetical order.

The Civil Code and the Act respecting the implementation of the reform of the Civil Code have no alphanumerical designation. It is possible to locate both enactments on the appropriate websites using designations that contain their year of adoption, being respectively CCQ-1991 and CCQ-1992. Those two designations, however, exist solely to enable the computer to accept the search and are in no case to be considered official reference designations.

Regulations

Regulations are identified and classed under their enabling statute, followed by a sequential number determined by the first letter of the main subject in the French title.

4. CITATIONS OF LAWS AND REGULATIONS IN THE COMPILATION

Citation of laws and regulations

In any document published in the Gazette officielle du Québec, or incidental to acts of the Conseil exécutif, a statute or regulation in the Compliation of Québec Laws and Regulations is cited as follows:

• Public Administration Act (chapter A-6.01)
• Regulation respecting travel agents (chapter A-10, r. 1)

In a document not published in the Gazette officielle du Québec, whether a judgment, academic writing or legal opinion, the acronym CQLR, without periods, follows the title of the statute or regulation:

• Public Administration Act (CQLR, chapter A-6.01) or (CQLR, c. A-6.01)
• Regulation respecting travel agents (CQLR, chapter A-10, r. 1) or (CQLR, c. A-10, r. 1)

Citation of the Civil Code

The Civil Code is cited without reference. In the statutes and regulations in the Compilation, "Civil Code of Québec" or "Civil Code" is used.

For documents not forming part of the Compilation, the citation "Civil Code of Québec (CQLR)" is used, the acronym CQLR being included solely to identify the Compilation of Québec Laws and Regulations in which the official version of the Civil Code is found.

A regulation made under the Civil Code and contained in the Compilation is cited as follows:

• Regulation respecting land registration (chapter CCQ, r. 6)

In non-Compilation texts, regulations are cited as follows:

• Regulation respecting land registration (CQLR, chapter CCQ, r. 6) or (CQLR, c. CCQ, r. 6)

5. UPDATINGS

The Compilation is updated at regular intervals on the Publications du Québec website, on a monthly basis when practicable. The updating may concern both the statutes and the regulations, or one type of enactment only.

Updating consists of incorporating repeals, revocations, replacements, additions and other amendments in force made to the enactment by the National Assembly, the Government or another competent authority.

6. INFORMATION NOTES

Each Compilation updating is preceded by an information note published on the Publications du Québec website five days prior to publication of the updating.

In the event that current updating operations only have been made, the information note will state that fact specifically.

The information note also specifies the nature of any operations made by the Minister under the second paragraph of section 3 of the Act respecting the Compilation of Québec Laws and Regulations.

For example, the information note may

• state that modifications were made to texts in the Compilation for linguistic reasons, such as the introduction of terms approved by the Office québécois de la langue française or adjustments to favour Canadian spelling;
• provide a list of texts modified for concordance reasons to ensure the English and French texts are consistent (obvious discrepancy between the two texts).

The information note will not describe in detail the modifications made to the Compilation as part of current updating operations described in the first paragraph of section 3 of the Act respecting the Compilation of Québec Laws and Regulations. Modifications to correct grammar or data processing, transcription, reference or other similar types of errors will not be mentioned.

Since 1 January 2014, a reference is inserted under each section for which a correction has been made under the second paragraph of section 3 of the Act respecting the Compilation of Québec Laws and Regulations. A list of the corrections is provided in the information notes published on the Publications du Québec website.

The reference is given as follows: "I.N. 2014-01-01", which shows the correction was listed in the information note dated 1 January 2014.

All information notes are archived and available at all times on the Publications du Québec website.

7. PRESERVATION OF THE HISTORICAL RECORD OF UPDATED PROVISIONS AND POINT IN TIME RECONSTITUTION OF TEXTS

The history of the various provisions in the statutes is accessible on the Publications du Québec website to subscribers to Légis Québec. For statute sections and most statute schedules, the historical record of the provisions makes it possible to search earlier versions back to 31 December 1977, the date of the last general statute consolidation.

Note, however, that historical versions of statutes before 1 January 2010 have no official status.

It is also possible to reconstitute an entire legislative enactment to reproduce how it read on a specific date. For the vast majority of statutes, that date is 1 April 1999 or later, but for the Civil Code and the Act respecting the implementation of the reform of the Civil Code, the earliest date is 1 January 1994, the date on which they came into force. An historic reconstitution of the Taxation Act is possible for any date after1 March 2006.

For regulations, the earliest date for historical versions is 1 September 2012.

8. INSTRUCTIONS ON ANY OTHER SUBJECT RELATING TO UPDATING ACTIVITIES

As part of the updating process, the Minister may give special instructions to have the form of texts modified for the purpose of uniformity or harmonization within the Compilation. For example, the instructions may deal with standardizing punctuation or adjusting texts in either or both languages to achieve linguistic harmony.

The Minister may give instructions to have tools developed to facilitate consultation of legislative and regulatory texts, such as historical notes to be added at the end of statutes. The Minister could also decide to have a list of transitional provisions placed at the end of a statute or regulation.

9. COMING INTO FORCE

This Policy replaces the Policy concerning the Compilation of Québec Laws and Regulations dated 3 January 2013 and comes into force on 1 April 2014.