Author Archives: Drew Yewchuk

About Drew Yewchuk

B.A. (UAlberta) J.D. (UCalgary) LLM (U.B.C.) Drew was a full-time staff lawyer with the University of Calgary's Public Interest Law Clinic from 2018-2022. He is now an PhD student at the Peter A. Allard School of Law. His research focuses on administrative secrecy, access to information law, species at risk, resource law, and environmental liabilities.

When Solicitor-Client Privilege Protects the Government from You

By: Drew Yewchuk

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Decision Commented On: Edmonton Police Service v Alberta (Information and Privacy Commissioner), 2020 ABQB 207

Edmonton Police Service v Alberta (Information and Privacy Commissioner), 2020 ABQB 207 (EPS v IPC) is a decision on judicial review of Order F2018-36 (Re), made by an adjudicator at the Office of the Information and Privacy Commissioner (OIPC). The decision addresses the “Privileged Information” exemption from disclosure found in section 27 of Alberta’s Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act, RSA 2000 C-F-25 (FOIP). This post discusses the background to the decision and offers some commentary on the broader freedom of information implications of the decision. Continue reading →

Freedom of Information in Alberta: The Troubles With the OIPC

By: Drew Yewchuk

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Decision Commented On: Re Alberta Health, F2019-16, 2019 CanLII 33710

This is the third in a series of posts on Alberta’s access to information legislation, the Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act, RSA 2000, c F-25 (FOIP Act). The first post set out the basic structure of the access to information, and the second post was a case study on the use of the FOIP Act. This post focuses on the Office of the Information and Privacy Commissioner (OIPC), which serves as the initial dispute resolution mechanism for FOIP issues. The post also describes how the “adequate alternative remedy principle” can make troubled administrative review bodies into obstacles to effective oversight. Continue reading →

The 2018/2019 Year in Access to Justice Issues on ABlawg

By: Drew Yewchuk

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The Canadian Bar Association’s Access to Justice Week in Alberta runs from September 28-October 5, 2019. This annual event is meant to highlight the ongoing inequality in access to legal services and legal dispute resolution mechanisms in Canada. Many Canadians are unable to protect their rights and interests in our legal system. This means those on the lower economic rungs are subject to the law but rarely protected by it – a black mark on the rule of law in Canada. The full list of events can be accessed at the website here.

This is a summary of ABlawg posts dealing with access to justice issues from September 2018 to September 2019. These posts covered important issues on access to justice issues, and I start by following up on the four indicator issues discussed in my post from last year. Continue reading →

Material and Cultural Causes of Delay

By: Drew Yewchuk

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Case Commented On: R v King, 2019 ABQB 467

This is the seventh instalment in my long-running series of blog posts covering Alberta decisions dealing with the fallout of R v Jordan, 2016 SCC 27, released almost three years ago. This post starts with a discussion of the recent R v King, 2019 ABQB 467, which covers one of the two live issues about Jordan that will be going up before the SCC: whether or not the time between when an application or case is heard and when it is decided (often called ‘judicial delay’; I will refer to it as ‘judicial decision-making time’) is excluded from the delay calculation. This issue will be before the Supreme Court as part of R v KGK, 2019 MBCA 9, on September 25, 2019. (The second issue is how the timelines apply to minors, an issue in the appeal of R v KJM, 2018 ABCA 278, which the SCC heard in February 2019). The second part of the blog post discusses some longer-term impacts of Jordan, and some of the limitations of the decision. Continue reading →

A Stressful Legal System Creates Vexatious Self-Reps

By: Drew Yewchuk & Christine Laing

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Case Commented On: Davis v Alberta (Human Rights Commission), 2019 ABQB 6 (CanLII)

Davis v Alberta (Human Rights Commission) is a judicial review of a decision by the Acting Chief of the Alberta Human Rights Commission (AHRC) to dismiss three complaints filed by Ms. Davis with the AHRC. There are no significant developments in human rights law in this decision, but it offers a good opportunity to consider the impact of administrative delays in dispute resolution mechanisms on individuals, especially self-represented ones. Davis also offers an example where the Alberta Court of Queen’s Bench was invited to find a self-represented litigant vexatious for the purposes of a costs decision.

Continue reading →