An article now up on the Lawyer’s Daily website discusses the issue of retired Supreme Court of Canada judges returning to legal practice and contains commentary from CALE President Amy Salyzyn, CALE Vice-President Stephen Pitel and CALE member Gavin MacKenzie.
Author Archives: amysalyzyn
Agenda for CALE Annual Conference
Adding Courts to the Lawyer Wellness Discussion
CALE President Amy Salyzyn has written in Slaw.ca about the role that courts might play in facilitating lawyer wellness.
OBA Foundation Chief Justice of Ontario Fellowships
2019-20 WINNERS
The winners for the 2019-20 year are Kelly Gallagher-Mackay of Wilfred Laurier University in the Fellowship in Research category and Deanne Sowter, a Research Fellow at Osgoode Hall Law School, in the Studies category. Prof. Gallagher-Mackay will by studying the experiences of international law graduates in Ontario after receiving Certificates of Qualification from the National Council on Accreditation, to practice law in Ontario. She will be studying the effect of these lawyers and candidates on the internationalization of legal and professional education. Ms. Sowter will be studying the question whether psychological or coercive harm should be included in the professional rules exempting physical violence or harm from duties of confidentiality and solicitor-client privilege. Both projects promise to advance the law’s understanding of emergent and important topics that affect the practice of law in Canada.
The Absent Ethics of Legal Fees : Putting Profit-Seeking in Its Place
CALE Board Member Noel Semple has written in Slaw.ca about the need for clearer ethical rules in relation to legal fees.
The Costs of Regulation
The Law Society of Ontario Treasurer and CALE Member, Malcolm Mercer has a new post up at Slaw.ca that breaks down the licensing fee and insurance costs paid by an Ontario lawyer in private practice in order to practice law.
Registration Open for 2019 CALE Annual Conference
Registration is now open for the 2019 CALE Annual Conference, which will be hosted by Windsor Law, in Windsor Ontario, October 24-26, 2019.
The conference will have a similar format to previous conferences. There will be three Research panels, a Teaching panel, a Regulatory panel, as well as a keynote speaker, Professor Rebecca Roiphe (New York Law School), who will discuss “Prosecutorial Independence During the Trump Administration”. A detailed agenda will be posted early in the fall.
For more details and to register, please go to this website.
Modern Courts and the Need for Judicial Technological Competence
CALE President Amy Salyzyn has a new column up at Slaw.ca wherein she takes the position that there should be a formally recognized duty of technological competence for Canadian judges.
Additional Feedback from CALE/ACEJ to Canadian Judicial Council on the review of the Ethical Principles for Judges
Latest Issue of Canadian Bar Review
The latest issue of the Canadian Bar Review is up with lots of great legal ethics content. Link here.
The abstracts of three articles with a particular focus on the legal profession/legal ethics are below.
PROTECTING THE PUBLIC INTEREST: LAW SOCIETY DECISION-MAKING AFTER TRINITY WESTERN UNIVERSITY
Abstract
Can current law society policy-making structures effectively assess and advance the public interest? This article considers whether law societies can fulfill their mandate to regulate in the public interest when benchers make policy decisions in hard cases, using the Canadian law societies’ response to Trinity Western University’s (“TWU”) attempt to open a law school as a case study. In our view, the TWU case highlights the structural obstacles that can impede the law societies’ accomplishment of their public interest mandate. We conclude that current law society decision-making structures create significant challenges and suggest several changes that could enhance the public interest decision-making of the law societies.
LEGAL ETHICS AND CANADA’S MILITARY LAWYERS
Abstract
Military lawyers—lawyers who are legal officers in the Canadian Forces—are virtually ignored in the Canadian legal literature. This article assesses what appear to be the most striking potential legal ethics issues facing military lawyers. Several of these issues arise because military lawyers are both lawyers and military officers at the same time, and therefore face two sets of obligations that interact in complex ways. Some issues, however, arise because of the special practice contexts of military lawyers, for example, advising military commanders on the law of armed conflict.
As context for this discussion, the article examines the relationship and tension between the Judge Advocate General and the Minister of Justice. It concludes with recommendations for amendments to the rules of professional conduct and the legislation governing the Canadian Forces to resolve these ethical issues. The article also proposes legislative amendments to clarify the relationship, and reduce the tension, between the Judge Advocate General and the Minister of Justice.
LOYALTY, LEGALITY AND PUBLIC SECTOR LAWYERS
Abstract
This article examines the duties of loyalty that public sector lawyers owe to their government clients and how considerations of legality limit this duty. It focuses on a recent decision of the Federal Court of Appeal in Schmidt v Canada involving a senior government lawyer’s court challenge to the legal position of the Minister of Justice (in whose department he was employed) on the Minister’s statutory obligation to report on the inconsistency of government bills with the Charter and the Canadian Bill of Rights.
The article argues that, while loyalty and legality are both critically important elements that shape the role of government lawyers, neither should be pursued at all costs. Loyalty is essential for maintaining the respect and confidence of public officials in the lawyers who advise them. And although their essential role is to support government adherence to law, this role is tempered by the uncertainty inherent in many aspects of law relating to matters of public policy and the role of the courts to resolve these uncertainties. Public sector lawyers must respect and support the choices of the government officials they advise in all but the clearest circumstances of illegality. The threshold for publicly attacking the legality of government decisions is very high, mirroring the standard the Federal Courts have recognized in Schmidt: no credible argument to support legality. Anything less risks eroding the influence public sector lawyers have with the officials they serve, and ultimately eroding the rule of law itself.