Classes began again at Osgoode Hall Law School yesterday - August 30th (there ought to be a law, no classes until after Labour Day!).I'm offering the seminar on law reform again this year. We take advantage of the existence of the Law Commission of Ontario to look in concrete terms at how law reform by a freestanding law reform agency "is done", but we also talk about the history of law reform and the different models of law reform agencies. And we don't forget that law reform is an activity in which many organizations engage, government itself, of course, but also interest groups, community clinics, organizations such as the Ontario Bar Association and on and on. As someone else has said, it's a "crowded field". It's also a very active field.The course provides an opportunity to make sense of the crowded field and to give students a chance to work through a project proposal or to critique the methodology we've applied for an LCO project.Law reform agencies are always vulnerable, but a broad view of law reform is essential to democratic societies. As with other essential aspects of law, it should be part of the law school curriculum.  

Every year provincial, territorial and federal justice bureaucrats meet to further the project of legislative harmonization.Last year the meeting was in Ottawa, the year before in Quebec City and the year before that in Charlottetown. This year, we're off to Halifax to engage in a particular kind of law reform over the next week.

Delegates of each province invite representatives of the law reform agencies to attend. Some of those reps have been going for many years and have taken a major role in the work of the ULCC. The Law Commission of Ontario is still a relative newcomer, but I see real benefits in attending. While we may have something to contribute to the ULCC from time to time, the LCO hears first hand about the issues that have been identified as significant. It is an easy way to find out whether the ULCC is considering a project in an area the LCO has identified as a potential project. As with most of these events, the contacts are important.

The ULCC, by necessity, even if not by philosophy, might undertake their harmonization projects differently from the way we undertake our bigger projects (with widespread public consultation), and the results take the form of uniform acts. It is a quiet body, with not a great deal of public presence, but the ULCC can be an important agent of law reform. Its very purpose is to provide the legislative tool to bring greater uniformity to quite often very different provincial/territorial legislation. Whether the harmonization is realized depends on the responses of governments. Sometimes a number, but not all, provinces will enact a uniform act, or some variant of the ULCC drafted act. It may take time. But there have certainly been successes. And this is an opportunity for a glimpse into a different kind of law reform, always a good thing.

LCO staff are on their way to Owen Sound and London this coming week to meet with persons with disabilities and with providers of services and advocacy groups to gain up close insights into their experience with the law. These consultations wouldn't be possible without the assistance of the organizations that have collaborated with us, helping us find participants for the focus groups, providing space and making sure that we liaise with these communities with greater awareness than we might otherwise have.

Upcoming: focus groups in Thunder Bay and Ottawa.  All the time: our on-line survey. Check the project participation page to get more information.

First a reminder that the deadline for submissions on our Consultation Paper in the Joint and Several Liability under the Ontario Business Corporations Act is June 30, 2010.

Staff working on the LCO project on developing a coherent approach to the law as it affects persons with disabilities began meeting with focus groups in Toronto this week. This is just the beginning of an extensive consultation that will take them to London, Ottawa, Owen Sound and Thunder Bay to meet with persons with disabilities, service providers, including the government, and advocacy groups. 

Julie Lassonde, the head of the family law process project, is in the finishing stages of a major paper that reviews the results of the consultation she carried out from late fall 2009 to the winter of this year. When it's complete, it will be posted on the website and will play a major role in the development of the interim report. 

Mark Schofield, head of our project on the Modernization of the Provincial Offences Act is busy meeting Justices of the Peace, municipal lawyers, paralegals and others with an interest in the operation of the POA. The next step is the preparation of the Interim Report which will include recommendations. It will be distributed for feedback.

Let's hear from you!

Apropos of the motion before Parliament that the government is in
contempt of Parliament for failing to produce documents relating to the
Afghan detainee situation, I came across a discussion about the government of Victoria's refusal to produce documents to the state Legislative Council that suggests the refusal was wrong in law. The case occurred in 2007. I don't pretend to be able to comment on the Australian
situation which was based on a claim of executive privilege, while the
Conservative Government is relying on "national security" to refuse to
produce the documents, as required by a motion passed by Parliament
last December. I do agree with the experts quoted in yesterday's Globe
and Mail to the effect that this is a highly significant juncture in
our system of government, that could change the constitutional
relationship between Parliament and the executive, even though the
Speaker's ruling may be only one step in the process. Joined
particularly (but not only) with the prorogation last December, the
government's resistance to the order to produce documents, along with
the inappropriate referral to a third party to consider which documents
should be released, shows how fragile the Canadian constitutional
structure is when there is not common acceptance of the basic rules of
the parliamentary system as part of our political culture. 

It seems that once again we've learned that our commitment to the principles of liberal democracy falters when challenged by something we don't like. We are all for free speech when we agree with what people say or we don't care what people say. It doesn't take long, though, before the thought of speech we don't like makes us resile from the principle. In saying this, I am not saying that anything goes. I believe that there are limits to the kinds of speech we ought to protect. In short, the debate is about how far we are prepared to tolerate what we don't like in order to realize a principle that is fundamental to our we define Canadian society.But speech isn't my issue today.Rather, I wonder about "our" (quotation marks because we are not all implicated in this) latest challenge to pluralism: the transport of France's desire to stamp out difference in the form of the naqib to Quebec. The latest version of this is an excellent example of how overreaching can result in achieving exactly the opposite of the reason for overreaching in the first place. Or, we could call this, "cutting off your nose to spite your face". According to a story in the Globe and Mail on April 12, 2010, "Muslim told to unveil or leave French class", another woman covering her face ("Aisha") was told to leave her French class if she wouldn't unveil. The reason is Quebec's insistence that immigrants conform to existing practices and not threaten Quebec values. The province introduced a bill in March that requires anyone seeking government services to do so unveiled. The purpose? To protect gender equality and secularism. It received the support of both Prime Minister Stephen Harper and Opposition Leader Michael Ignatieff. Aisha was taking government-sponsored  French lessons in order to integrate more effectively into Quebec society. Her teachers and classmates spoke highly of Aisha's ability to learn French, regardless of being veiled, and of her working with other students, including male students. The Executive Director of the language centre wrote to the Immigration Department to say that she was a very good student. Rather than learning skills to integrate, Aisha is now staying at home. It's called "cutting off your nose to spite your face".