#Yesallwomen/#Notallmen: Sexual Harassment in the Legal Profession

By: Alice Woolley

PDF Version:#Yesallwomen/#Notallmen: Sexual Harassment in the Legal Profession

How do we understand bad things done to women by men?  Through the few men who do them (#Notallmen)?  Through misogyny in our culture as a whole?  Through the experience of all women living with the risk that such bad things can happen (#Yesallwomen)? The ferocity of recent internet debate on this topic clouds the possibility that harm done by men to women should be understood as about all these things: the men who inflict it, the society in which it occurs and the lives of the women who live with the possibility of that threat.

In this post I explore the thought that sexual harassment and sexual discrimination in the legal profession must be understood with this sort of breadth of perspective: it is conduct reflecting the pathologies of the specific men who do it; it in no way reflects the conduct of all – or even that many – men in the profession; yet it is conduct that reflects aspects of our professional culture, aspects that we need to address to achieve gender equity and fairness.

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Sealing: It’s a Moral Not a Technical Issue and Animals Outweigh Indigenous Communities

By: Elizabeth Whitsitt and Nigel Bankes

PDF Version: Sealing: It’s a Moral Not a Technical Issue and Animals Outweigh Indigenous Communities

Decision commented on: World Trade Organization, Appellate Body Report – European Communities – Measures Prohibiting the Importation and Marketing of Seal Products (22 May 2014)

Just a few short weeks ago the World Trade Organization (WTO) issued its final word on the legality of a regime that bans seal products from the European Union (EU) market. In a decision that has Canadian and EU officials claiming victory, the WTO Appellate Body (AB) determined that the EU’s ban on seal products is justified under the right to protect public morals, specifically on the grounds of protecting animal welfare. The AB also found, however, that the ban is discriminatory in the way it is applied, and should be modified in order to fully comply with international trade obligations.

Briefly summarized, the measure at issue in this case bans the sale of seal products in all EU member states, subject to certain implicit and explicit exceptions. Explicitly, the measure permits the sale of seal products in the EU market if those products are: (i) derived from hunts carried out by indigenous peoples (IC), (ii) derived from hunts that were conducted for the sustainable management of marine resources (MRM), (iii) or personally imported into the EU by travellers. Implicitly, the measure also permits the import of seal products into the EU for process and re-export, a convenient loophole that protects commercial interests within the EU.

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Supreme Court Limits Employment Relationship in Human Rights Cases

By: Linda McKay-Panos

 PDF Version: Supreme Court Limits Employment Relationship in Human Rights Cases

Case commented on: McCormick v Fasken Martineau DuMoulin LLP, 2014 SCC 39

In an earlier post, I expressed hope that in McCormick, the Supreme Court of Canada would clear up the issue of “employment” in human rights cases. They have certainly spoken, but perhaps have not cleared up the issue in the way I was hoping they would.

Until recent times, employment (i.e. the legislative terms “employ”, “employee”, “employer”) was given a large and liberal interpretation, in keeping with the notion that human rights law is quasi-constitutional.  For example, an employment relationship would be found to exist for human rights law, where it might not be found for tax law. The trend of narrowing the interpretation of employment may contradict the educational and remedial purposes of human rights law. Concerns about this trend in law may explain why several human rights commissions —including Alberta’s—intervened in this Supreme Court of Canada case.

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Bishop Tutu: His Challenge to the Legal Profession on the Morals and Ethics of Climate Change

By: Kathleen Mahoney

PDF Version: Bishop Tutu: His Challenge to the Legal Profession on the Morals and Ethics of Climate Change

Conference Commented On: As Long as the Rivers Flow: Coming Back to the Treaty Relationship in our Time, Fort McMurray, AB, May 31-June 1, 2014

I was privileged this past weekend to hear Desmond Tutu speak at a conference on climate change and treaty rights in Fort McMurray Alberta (see the program here). His remarks were directed at climate change in general and the Alberta oil sands development in particular. He clearly made the link between carbon emissions from the oil sands and climate change. He then situated the issue of climate change squarely in a moral and ethical dimension. He argued that consideration of this dimension must play a central role in legal and policy decisions about responses here in Canada and around the world.

It is clear that Tutu’s ethical and moral concerns touch on fundamental rights and the very nature of justice and equity. Distributive justice, compensatory justice, procedural justice and human rights are all implicated. We heard from many speakers at the conference that in the Canadian context, First Nations bear the brunt of resource development when their treaty rights, food sources, water and cultures are compromised by climate change and environmental damage.

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Greenpeace v Canada: Symbolic Blow to the Nuclear Industry, Game-changer for Everyone Else?

By: Martin Olszynski

 PDF Version: Greenpeace v Canada: Symbolic Blow to the Nuclear Industry, Game-changer for Everyone Else?

Case commented on: Greenpeace Canada v Canada (Attorney General), 2014 FC 463 (CanLII)

In this lengthy (431 paragraphs) decision, the Federal Court allowed in part Greenpeace et al’s application for judicial review regarding the Joint Review Panel report(the Report) for the Darlington New Nuclear project proposed by Ontario Power Generation (OPG). Justice Russell held that the environmental assessment (EA) conducted by the Joint Review Panel (JRP) failed to comply with the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act, SC 1992 c 37 (as it then was).  Specifically, there were gaps in the treatment of hazardous substances emissions and spent nuclear fuel, and a failure to consider the effects of a severe “common cause” accident.  As noted by the media, while the decision is of limited effect on a project already indefinitely postponed by the province, “it is a symbolic blow to an industry coping with the public and political fallout from Japan’s 2011 Fukushima meltdown.”  As further discussed below, the decision is also likely to have implications for EA in Canada generally and several other projects currently making their way through either the regulatory process or the courts, including Taseko’s New Prosperity mine, Enbridge’s Northern Gateway pipeline and Kinder Morgan’s Trans Mountain pipeline.

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