I'll huff and I'll puff...
... and I'll
invoke notwithstanding. Here's a quick rundown of how the Constitution's opt-out right (ha ha, there's that word again) has been used in the past, as noted a recent piece by
La Presse's Yves Boisvert: The federal government has never had the nerve to invoke the notwithstanding clause. Never.
Saskatchewan used it in 1986 for labour legislation, and Alberta used it (or threatened to use it?) in a same-sex marriage bill that it doesn't have the jurisdiction to pass in the first place, since who gets hitched is Ottawa's call.
Only Quebec has adopted notwithstanding as a regular practice -- or had, for a time. A Parti Quebecois government inserted it into every piece of legislation in 1982 just to symbolically stick it to the feds. The clause has an expiry date, too, of five years. Notwithstanding was NOT renewed in 1987.
It's been invoked by Quebec eight other times, most notably to allow for a French-language-is-the-tops bill. In response, three cabinet ministers resigned, and the United Nations slammed Quebec for ignoring human rights.