David Leitch

Author: David Leitch

David Leitch was called to the Ontario Bar in 1978 and completed an LL.M.in constitutional law at Osgoode Hall Law School in 2000. He was a Residential School Adjudicator from 2007 to 2010. Since 2008, he has acted for several northwestern Ontario First Nations in relation to their specific claims for timber trespass and unlawful flooding. In 2016-17, he was counsel for the Lac Seul First Nation at the Southwind trial and acted for intervenors at the Supreme Court of Canada in that case and the Grassy Narrows case.

By: David Leitch

Matter commented on: R c Montour, 2023 QCCS 4154 (CanLII)

PDF Version: A Misstep on the Road to Reconciliation

Critics of the Supreme Court of Canada’s definition of aboriginal rights in R v Van der Peet, 1996 CanLII 216 (SCC), [1996] 2 SCR 507 may applaud the Quebec Superior Court’s decision in R c Montour, 2023 QCCS 4154 (CanLII) that attempts to re-write this definition so that it conforms to the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (the Declaration). But this post maintains that court-based battles of this kind do little to promote reconciliation. The Declaration will better promote reconciliation by being implemented through new treaties and federal legislation drafted in consultation with Indigenous peoples.