Access to Justice
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March 13, 2026
Human Rights Tribunal orders sweeping deaf inmate accommodation reforms in federal prisons
The Canadian Human Rights Tribunal (CHRT) has ordered sweeping reforms to how federal prisons accommodate deaf inmates, ruling that Correctional Service Canada (CSC) must provide ASL interpretation for key meetings and meaningful daily communication.
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March 13, 2026
Eight grounds for appeal dismissed in Ontario murder of appellant’s partner, child
After a four-month trial, Glenn Bauman was found guilty of two counts of first-degree murder in the deaths of his common law partner, Linda Daniel, and her young daughter, Cheyenne. The trial took place five years after their disappearance.
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March 13, 2026
The modern bill of attainder: Why women still pay a ‘proxy tax’
On International Women’s Day, you likely saw the pink-themed infographics and corporate “empowerment” lunches. But past the glossy surface, the actual gears of our society reveal something much older and darker: a modern version of collective punishment that falls almost exclusively on women.
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March 12, 2026
Ontario Superior Court of Justice abolishes Zoom hearings for Toronto family law cases
In a sweeping policy shift poised to dramatically increase the cost of separation and divorce for thousands of Toronto families, the Family Branch of the Ontario Superior Court of Justice has announced that, effective April 2, 2026, all family law motions at the Toronto courthouse will presumptively proceed in person — and no longer by Zoom.
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March 12, 2026
Lowering the rate of Indigenous over-incarceration in Saskatchewan
Canada’s criminal law is written in Ottawa, but the provinces enforce it. That constitutional division helps explain why incarceration rates vary so dramatically across the country. Nowhere is the contrast more striking than in Saskatchewan, which has at times recorded the highest incarceration rate in Canada and one of the highest among sub-national jurisdictions in the western world.
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March 12, 2026
Student paper snapshots in animal law: Animals vs. plastics
As part of my ongoing Student Paper Snapshots in Animal Law series in these pages, I am not only featuring my own animal law students from the Peter A. Allard School of Law at UBC, but I have also invited students from other universities to showcase their thought-provoking research papers.
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March 11, 2026
The billable hour is running out of time
Early in my career, I noticed a pattern I could not ignore. I would build rapport with clients, earn their trust and then watch everything fall apart the moment the invoice was sent. They were not upset with me personally, even though sometimes it felt that way. They were blindsided by a system that charged them in a way they found unfair. Even worse, I would get penalized if I found strategies to be fast and efficient to make it more fair.
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March 10, 2026
Sex assault appeal: Judge entitled to consider totality of evidence when assessing credibility
Daniel Shee Chong was convicted of sexual offences based on the accounts of two former piano students, AR and MJ, and two others, DP and MR.
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March 10, 2026
Keegstra in Bill C-9: An Act to Amend the Criminal Code: Hate propaganda, hate crime access
More than three decades after the Supreme Court of Canada decided R. v. Keegstra, [1990] 3 S.C.R. 697, the case continues to shape how Canadians think about hate speech, free expression and the limits of the Charter. Yet, while legal analysis has focused intensely on constitutional doctrine, far less attention has been paid to the place that gave rise to the case: Eckville, a small rural community in central Alberta. Revisiting Keegstra today, particularly in light of renewed legislative debates surrounding Bill C-9, requires not only revisiting the court’s reasoning, but also reconsidering how Eckville and central Alberta itself has been constructed in media, academic and greater legal narratives.
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March 09, 2026
Courtroom to community: Reconciliation means amplifying access to justice, Indigenous voices
“Canada’s adoption of the UNDRIP into Canadian law via the UNDA must mean more than a status quo application of the section 35 framework,” wrote Justice Julie Blackhawk in the seminal Kebaowek First Nation v. CNL federal court case (Kebaowek First Nation v. Canadian Nuclear Laboratories, [2025] F.C.J. No. 300). For the Indigenous grassroot leaders and youth seeking to intervene in the constitutional challenge to the provincial government’s Bill 5 that was passed in June 2025, this revisioning of the status quo remains a live issue.