Having suffered in the past from numerous health problems including a hip replacement, 73-year-old salesman George Zeliotis became an advocate for reducing waiting times for patients in Quebec hospitals.

She goes on to note that the long waits at hospitals can result in deaths and that private health care prohibited by the Quebec Acts would likely have saved those lives.

She adopts a broad interpretation, citing R. v. Morgentaler among others as examples of delay in medical treatment as a violation of security of person.

Under the Quebec plan, the government can control its human resources in various ways, whether by using the time of professionals who have already reached the maximum for payment by the state, by applying the provision that authorizes it to compel even nonparticipating physicians to provide services (s. 30 HEIA) or by implementing less restrictive measures, like those adopted in the four Canadian provinces that do not prohibit private insurance or in the other OECD countries.

While the government has the power to decide what measures to adopt, it cannot choose to do nothing in the face of the violation of Quebecers' right to security.

In defence of this, they criticize the dissenters' rejection of international data as well and reliance on what they characterized as inconsistent reports from Romanow and Senator Kirby.

In our view, the appellants' case does not rest on constitutional law but on their disagreement with the Quebec government on aspects of its social policy.

Binnie and LeBel primarily take issue with the majority's claim that the law is arbitrary contrary to the principles of fundamental justice.

appellants' argument about "arbitrariness" is based largely on generalizations about the public system drawn from fragmentary experience, an overly optimistic view of the benefits offered by private health insurance, an oversimplified view of the adverse effects on the public health system of permitting private sector health services to flourish and an overly interventionist view of the role the courts should play in trying to supply a "fix" to the failings, real or perceived, of major social programs.

[7]They admit agreeing with the majority and the trial judge that the law will put some Quebecers life and "security of person" at risk, but they do not see the matter being resolved by or applicable to the constitution.

[8]In effect, the dissenters say, the Court is only protecting the right to contract and pushing Canada into its own Lochner era, while dismissing those that claimed privatizing will not necessarily solve the problem.

They characterize the majority's use of the word "arbitrary" as meaning "unnecessary," claiming that if that were true, it would require the courts to interfere too much with lawmakers.

Binnie and LeBel distinguish R. v. Morgentaler from the current case, as the former was about "manifest unfairness" and criminal liability, not arbitrariness and public health policy, which, they claim, requires a very different analytical approach.

The decision proved to be highly contentious by its political nature and its conflict with the present government's policy on health.