Gavin McKenzie (right), who officially passed the torch as treasurer of the Law Society of Upper Canada this morning after two and a half years, took the opportunity in his farewell remarks to give the assembled benchers a little history lesson and a warning. The first meeting of the Law Society took place in a Toronto hotel in 1797, he said; more than half of the soon-to-be benchers were under 30, and one was 19 years old. The first treasurer, John White, was 36 when he took the post, and, McKenzie noted, he died less than three years later after being shot in a duel for insulting the wife of the clerk of the Executive Council of Upper Canada. We can’t recall what exactly this had to do with his farewell to the treasurer’s chair, but it livened things up a bit. McKenzie warned the assembled benchers that law societies’ self-regulation had been throttled back or eliminated in other jurisdictions, and that they should be vigilant in protecting the LSUC’s autonomy. It “shouldn’t be complacent,” he said, adding that the society “can’t be dismissive of challenges,” whether those criticisms are informed or otherwise. Such challenges to self-regulation are on the horizon, he said: “I hope you will be ready.”
The rest of the morning was new treasurer Derry Millar’s show, and it went pretty smoothly, except right at the start: Jack Rabinovitch’s dog started barking frantically on the conference call during Millar’s opening remarks, after which Rabinovitch put his phone on hold, so that it made a ‘boop boop’ noise on the speakerphone every ten seconds. Eventually Millar called a break so they could fix the phone situation.
There was plenty of business to get to: Dr. Patricia Hughes made a presentation on the new Law Commission of Ontario, which was launched last year as a joint project of the Law Society, the Law Foundation of Ontario, the Attorney General, and Osgoode Hall. The LCO has a mandate to suggest and evaluate legal reforms in Ontario: at the moment, they’re considering a law that would prohibit financial institutions from charging fees to cash government cheques; how to value and divide a pension during a divorce proceeding; and evaluating how the law should accommodate senior citizens.
The motion that produced the most discussion was one from the finance committee increasing the pay that benchers receive for doing work for the law society. This involved a couple of things: First, they’ve now defined a “half day” of work as anything less than three hours within one 24-hour period; anything more than three hours is a “full day” of work. There are 14 activities that count as “work” under the bylaw change, and they range from attending convocation, going to educational sessions, prepping written decisions after hearing a hearing of the appeals panel, and others. The most noticeable change is that benchers will now be compensated for travel time, not just working time (this is intended to make it fairer for the ones who have to travel hours to make it to Toronto for a hearing, for instance). Finally, the per diem fee was raised to bring it inline with inflation since 2005, when the prices were last set. Benchers will now get $530 per day, or $320 for a half day. It’s important to note that they can only claim this pay after having worked gratis for the law society for at least 26 days. One bencher said she would be voting against the motion because she disagreed with the whole proposition of paying benchers, but the vote passed handily.
A couple other motions passed which aren’t earth shattering, but will make a real difference to some people: First, the by-laws were changed to restore summer students rights of appearance when they’re working for corporate or government practice, and to allow students who are being supervised by licensed paralegals to do paralegal work. Second, the by-laws were amended so that lawyers who pay 50 or 25 percent of the usual LSUC annual fee will no longer be forced to pay the 100 percent fee if they do pro bono work approved by Pro Bono Law Ontario (PBLO). Previously, doing any sort of legal work immediately bumped you up into the full-fee category, even if you weren’t actually making any money at it. With this rule, lawyers who have gone back to school, gone on parental leave, or who work but don’t provide any legal services will be able to do pro bono work without financial penalty.