The deafening silence from in-house counsel and their professional associations about the Ford government’s $130 million in cuts to Legal Aid Ontario is nothing less than shameful. While it’s true that the Canadian Bar Association (CBA) has launched a social media campaign (#LegalAidMatters) to rally the profession to the cause, and all 13 CBA branch […]
Even with a bedrock of legal principle at stake, Ecuadorean villagers’ battle with Chevron had equities at its heart “I looked at the stuff and said yes.” That is Alan Lenczner’s succinct summary of the advice he gave to a group of Ecuadorean plaintiffs who consulted his firm, Lenczner Slaght Royce Griffin Smith LLP, about […]
The British Columbia Supreme Court has found that an individual who was the “directing mind of a company,” but not a trustee of its pension plan, was personally liable for a contribution shortfall because he “knowingly assisted” the company in breaches of its fiduciary duties. “The case is a heads-up, especially for small employers, to […]
Personal injury lawyers should examine the feasibility of structured settlements (a settlement paid out as an annuity, not all in one lump sum) more closely in today’s low interest environment, a veteran plaintiff’s counsel maintains. “The bar has become extremely comfortable with structures, partly because there’s no real incentive for lawyers to dig deeper,” says […]
Employers will have to completely reassess how they manage harassment and violence in the workplace, costing hundreds of millions All eyes may be on the numerous amendments to the Canada Labour Code (CLC) that take effect on Sept. 1, but their impact on the 18,000 federally regulated employers and 900,000 employees governed by the legislation […]
The “public interest,” it turns out, can be a real threat to democracy. It is, after all, the catchphrase that Prime Minister Justin Trudeau used to justify his contravention of the Conflict of Interest Act by pressuring former Justice Minister Jody Wilson-Raybould to negotiate a deferred prosecution agreement with SNC-Lavalin. The PM’s spin on the whole thing […]
With the Supreme Court of Canada’s decision to hear the appeal in 9354-9186 Québec inc., et al. v. Callidus Capital Corporation 2018 QCCA 632, litigation funding will for the first time be front and centre at the high court. And because it arises in the context of a Companies’ Creditors Arrangement Act proceeding, the decision will be particularly significant […]
An Alberta court has ruled that employees receiving disability payments during the reasonable notice period can’t “double-dip” by receiving payments for lost wages. “The decision affirms the principle that employees are entitled only to what they would have received had they been working during the notice period,” says Sheena Owens, an employment lawyer at Stikeman […]
In a general sense, what the Bureau wants to know is whether the characteristics of certain digital markets favour concentration — a process called ‘tipping’ The Competition Bureau’s recent call to Canadians to flag anti-competitive conduct in the digital economy is raising eyebrows among industry professionals. Certainly, the Bureau’s consultation seems far more concrete than […]
The Federal Court has limited the power of the Immigration and Refugee Board of Canada’s (IRB) chairperson to issue jurisprudential guides (JGs) on issues of fact, where the JGs create an “expectation” that board members were bound to follow the directives. Although Chief Justice Paul Crampton’s decision in Canadian Association of Refugee Lawyers v. Canada (Minster […]