Constitutional Roundtable: Athanasios (Akis) Psygkas
2018-01-31 12:30 - 14:00 (America/Toronto) | Jackman Law Building Room J140, 78 Queen’s Park
Constitutional Roundtable Presents
Athanasios (Akis) Psygkas
Lecturer in Law
University of Bristol Law School
on
Wednesday, January 31, 2018
12:30 – 2:00
Solarium (Room FA2), Falconer Hall
84 Queen’s Park
“The hydraulics of constitutional claims: Four models of democratic constitutionalism and same-sex marriage“
With Professor Brenda Cossman, Director of the Bonham Centre for Sexual Diversity Studies as Discussant
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Who makes constitutional claims? The paper argues that on both sides of the Atlantic a multiplicity of constitutional actors outside the courts participate in the elaboration of constitutional principles. I map out these constitutional actors by using as a case study the legal recognition of same-sex marriage in the United States, Spain, the United Kingdom, and Ireland. In all four country cases, there are common functional demands for democratic involvement in shaping constitutional meaning. Even though these demands may take various institutional and procedural forms owing to diverse political, institutional, and cultural contexts, I argue that the same overarching hydraulics effect is at play across jurisdictions. When social movements are shut out of one forum, they channel their constitutional claims through different institutional avenues.
The four systems represent distinctive models of formal recognition of same-sex marriage, with different actors taking the lead and having the final say on this contested issue. However, I explain that in all four cases we can detect the voices of multiple actors, including notably the people themselves, in a process of legal contestation around and interpretation of fundamental constitutional principles. These voices can take different forms, and the paper proposes institutional, historical, political, and cultural factors that may account for this. Thus, the paper tells a story of legal development arising from inclusive interpretive communities in the context of a democratic constitutional theory. This facilitates dynamic constitutional interpretation that reflects evolving political and social demands instead of top-down delivery of constitutional meaning.
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Athanasios (Akis) Psygkas is lecturer in law at the University of Bristol in the UK and currently a visiting scholar at the University of Toronto. His research interests include comparative public law, regulation, and global governance. His latest book, entitled “From the ‘Democratic Deficit’ to a ‘Democratic Surplus’: Constructing Administrative Democracy in Europe” (Oxford University Press, 2017), examines the impact of EU law on the adoption of participatory regulatory processes in the member states.
Akis received J.S.D. and LL.M. degrees from Yale Law School, where he was a Fulbright scholar, and an LL.B. and LL.M. in Public Law and Political Science from the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki (Greece). He has held fellowships at the European University Institute in Florence, the Institut d’Etudes Politiques (Sciences Po) in Paris, and Yale. He has been managing the Comparative Administrative Law Blog over the past seven years.
Light Lunch Provided
For further details, please contact tal.schreier@utoronto.ca
No Registration Required

Applications for 2018 Asper Centre Summer Fellowship Position Due
2018-02-20 12:00
Applications for Asper Centre Summer Fellowships are due on February 20, 2018.
Please find the 2018 Asper Centre Fellowship Guide here.
Also, current law students can log into the University of Toronto Law Career Network for further information on the application process.

Public Interest Litigation Conference
2018-03-02 08:30 - 16:30
View CONFERENCE Schedule Here
The Asper Centre convened a one-day Conference on March 2, 2018 focused on legal strategies for successful public interest litigation as a means to bring together relevant stakeholders to share their challenges, successes and strategies in this field. The Conference was aimed at both practitioners (lawyers and NGOs) who are engaged in public interest litigation and scholars and students who study and analyze the impact of these cases.
Over 25 papers in total were presented in 11 concurrent sessions throughout the day.
List of Participating Authors & Papers
1. Alexander, Basil: “Pragmatic Assorted Strategies: How Canadian Cause Lawyering Contributes to Social Change”
2. Anglin, Howard: “Public Interest Case Study: R v Comeau”
3. Bharati, Subodh and David Coté: “Scotland v Attorney General of Canada Case Study”
4. Blum, Joshua: “Ali v Attorney General of Canada Case Study”
5. Bredt, Chris & Ewa Krajewska: “Only 5 Minutes? The Supreme Court’s Approach to Interveners Requires Reform”
6. Bussey, Barry: “The Law of Intervention after the TWU case”
7. Chan, Kathryn & Howard Kislowicz: “Divine Intervention: A study of the operation and impact of NGO interveners in Canadian religious freedom litigation”
8. Giltrow, Maegan and Nathan Hume: “The Shadow Intervener: Economics and Public Interest Litigation”
9. Gold, Richard and Rachel Meland: “Litigating Patents in the Public Interest”
10. Grant, Angus: “Intervener Standing in Immigration and Refugee Cases”
11. Faraday, Fay, Tracy Heffernan & Helen Luu: “Winning the Right to Housing: A Holistic Approach to Public Interest Litigation in Three Voices”
12. Fenske, Allison and Joëlle Pastora Sala: “The Wheels of Justice for Vulnerable Individuals: Reflections from the Public Interest Law Centre of Legal Aid Manitoba”
13. Giorgio, Barbara: “Attorney General of Canada v Downtown Eastside Sex Workers: Judicially Precipitated Reform for Public Interest Advocacy”
14. Ha-Redeye, Omar: “When Public Interest Litigation is used as a Cover for Controversy”
15. Kennedy, Gerard and Lorne Sossin: “Justiciability, Access To Justice and the Development of Constitutional Law In Canada”
16. Laing, Christine: “Does Yaiguaje v Chevron Corporation change the security for costs game for public interest litigants?”
17. Latimer, Alison: “Examination of a Solitary Confinement Test Case”
18. Latner, Gabriel: “The Rights Stuff: Why Canada doesn’t have its own ACLU and how we can build one?”
19. Levesque, Anne: “The symbiotic relationship between social movements and public interest litigation: A case study of the I am a Witness Campaign and the human rights complaint of 165 000 First Nations kid”
20. Davidson, Gail and Gavin Magrath: “Balancing Act: Practical Lessons for Human Rights Interventions”
21. Mangat, Raji: “Here from the beginning: the promise of trial-level intervention”
22. Paterson, Josh: “The Carter case – Sustaining the Fight Both Inside and Outside the Courtroom”
23. Sheldon, Tess and Helgi Maki: “Trauma–Informed Strategies in Public Interest Litigation”
24. Sheppard, Dan: “Just Going Through the Motions: The Supreme Court, Interest Groups and the Performance of Intervention”
25. Silcoff, Maureen: “Party Status in Y.Z. v Canada (Citizenship and Immigration)”
26. Spector, Karen: “Legal Strategies for Intervention in Cases Seeking to Advance the Rights of Persons with Mental Health Disabilities”
27. Vaughan, Eleanor: “Solicitor Client Privilege in Lizotte v Aviva Insurance Company of Canada and Alberta (Information and Privacy Commissioner) v University of Calgary”
N.B. Full day attendance at the Conference may qualify for 6.5 Substantive CPD hours. Kindly also note that we have made an application for accreditation of Professionalism CPD hours with the Law Society of Ontario.

Asper Centre Immigration & Refugee Law student working group presents Senator Ratna Omidvar
2018-03-07 12:30 - 14:00 | J140 Jackman Law Building, 78 Queen's Park Cres, Toronto, Ontario, M5S 2C5, Canada
The Asper Centre’s Immigration & Refugee Law Student Working Group is honoured to host Senator Ratna Omidvar for a lunchtime seminar on Wednesday March 7, 2018 at 12h30. All students are welcome and encouraged to attend. Senator Omidvar will share her personal story of coming to Canada from India, and she will discuss issues related to inclusion and diversity in Canada, immigration and refugee law and policy, the Charter and progressive law reform. She will then take questions from the audience. This will be a great opportunity to get some insight from her inspiring career.
Light lunch will be provided
Email tal.schreier@utoronto.ca for further information.
About Senator Omidvar:

The Honourable Ratna Omidvar, C.M., O.Ont.
Senator for Ontario, The Senate of Canada
Ratna Omidvar is an internationally recognized voice on migration, diversity and inclusion. In April 2016, Prime Minister Trudeau appointed Ms. Omidvar to the Senate of Canada as an independent Senator representing Ontario. As a member of the Senate’s Independent Senators Group she holds a leadership position as the Scroll Manager.
Senator Omidvar is the founding Executive Director and currently a Distinguished Visiting Professor at the Global Diversity Exchange (GDX), Ted Rogers School of Management, Ryerson University. GDX is a think-and-do tank on diversity, migration and inclusion that connects local experience and ideas with global networks. Previously, Senator Omidvar was the President of Maytree, where she played a lead role in local, national and international efforts to promote the integration of immigrants.
Senator Omidvar is the current Co-Chair of the Global Future Council on Migration hosted by the World Economic Forum and serves as a Councillor on the World Refugee Council. She is also a director at the Environics Institute, and Samara Canada. Senator Omidvar is the Toronto Region Immigrant Employment Council’s Chair Emerita and was formerly the Chair of Lifeline Syria.
Senator Omidvar is co-author of Flight and Freedom: Stories of Escape to Canada (2015), an Open Book Toronto best book of 2015 and one of the Toronto Star‘s top five good reads from Word on the Street. She is also a contributor to The Harper Factor (2016) and co-editor of Five Good Ideas: Practical Strategies for Non-Profit Success (2011). Senator Omidvar received an Honorary Degree, Doctor of Laws, York University in 2012.
Senator Omidvar was appointed to the Order of Ontario in 2005 and became a Member of the Order of Canada in 2011, with both honours recognizing her advocacy work on behalf of immigrants and devotion to reducing inequality in Canada. In 2014, she received the Cross of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany in recognition of her contribution to the advancement of German-Canadian relations.

Asper Centre Clinical Course Application Due Date
2018-06-29 10:00
Applications for next year’s (Fall 2018)
Asper Centre Clinical Legal Education Course
are due on Friday June 29, 2018 at 10am.
The Asper Centre for Constitutional Rights is devoted to advocacy, research and education in the area of constitutional rights in Canada. Its cornerstone is a legal clinic bringing together students, faculty and members of the bar to work on significant constitutional cases. Appellate level cases that invoke the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms in innovative ways to promote social justice will be selected. It is expected that students will have the opportunity to work alongside practitioners and faculty in developing written and oral arguments, for academic credit. Daily casework could include case theory formulation, constitutional legal research, appellate brief and factum writing and attendance at oral argument. Projects may also include policy advocacy and research along with public legal education.
Substantive and procedural issues arising in advocating for constitutional rights will be explored through seminars and experiential learning. You will be exposed to skills-building seminars and case work and explore some of the legal, procedural, strategic, ethical and theoretical dimensions of issues that arise in cases and other forms of legal advocacy. The program challenges students to examine issues in significant constitutional cases and advocacy initiatives in a critical way, while at the same time allowing them to develop the professional and ethical literacy which is essential to the practice of law. Through their clinical work, written reflections, and weekly seminars, students will test relationships between constitutional principles and the practical realities of the advocacy process, and develop a conceptual and empirical understanding of constitutional lawyering.
The clinic will meet once a week for 3 hours. Part of each session will be organized as a seminar, which will focus on substantive issues in constitutional advocacy (eg. constitutional jurisdiction of various courts and tribunals; substantive basis for claims; roles of the various parties in Charter litigation; effective advocacy strategies) or on skills building (eg. research, drafting of pleadings, effective brief writing, analysis of legislation). Part of each session will be organized as discussions of the issues raised by the students casework and the issues involved in constitutional advocacy. Casework may include formulating case theories and advocacy strategies, legal research, drafting of briefs, facta or reports, or attending hearings.
Examples of past projects include:

Research and meetings with an advocacy organization on an election rights test case;
Litigation support (research and legal drafting) for the Centre’s Supreme Court interventions;
Research memorandum exploring advocacy alternatives for redress of rights infringements arising in situations such as the conditions in federal prison and the detention of refugee claimants.

Email cheryl.milne@utoronto.ca if you have any questions.

Deadline for Submission of Proposal for Asper Centre 2018-2019 Student Working Group
2018-08-15
U of T law students can become involved in the Asper Centre’s work through volunteering with one of our Working Groups.
For information on how to apply to lead a Working Group read the Proposal Requirements below.
If you would like to apply but need some ideas, contact Cheryl Milne or Tal Schreier by email.
This year, in addition to Working Group ideas developed by students, the Asper Centre invites and welcomes proposals from students who would be interested in leading a children’s rights working group, or a social media working group that would assist the Asper Centre in developing web-based and social media based material focused on constitutional issues.
Call for proposals for 2018/19 Asper Centre Working Groups

Asper Centre and IHRP Student Working Group Information Session
2018-09-11 12:30 - 14:00
JD students in all years can volunteer with one of the Asper Centre student working groups, that are led by upper year students. Working groups prepare policy briefs, organize workshops, and conduct research on emerging constitutional issues.
This year, there are three Asper Centre student working groups:

The Refugee and Immigration Law working group
The Indigenous Rights working group
Police Oversight working group

There are also four student working groups with the International Human Rights Program:

Mapping Global Health Rights
Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity Country-Conditions Reports
Making Women’s Human Rights Resources Accessible Globally
Digital Verification Corps

Find out more about these working groups at the information session on September 11, 2018 at 12:30PM in J250 in the Jackman law building.
To be eligible to sign up for one of the above working groups, you must attend this important info session.
Bring your own lunch!

Application Deadline for Work-Study Position
2018-09-14 12:00
Work-Study Position with Asper Centre
The Asper Centre is looking for a student to provide research, writing and technical support for the Centre’s website and social media (Facebook and Twitter). The position involves some research and drafting for content to be uploaded to the Centre’s website related to Canadian constitutional law and the activities of the Centre (primarily case summaries). Some support for Asper Centre events will also be expected. Training will be provided in respect to the website; therefore, in-depth knowledge of website development, maintenance and design, although helpful, is not required. Apply by September 14th 2018 at 12:00 p.m. through the University’s Career Centre page: http://cln.utoronto.ca (Job No. 125724).

Above the Law? The proposed Better Local Government Act constitutional challenge and Premier Ford's use of the Notwithstanding Clause
2018-09-20 16:30 - 18:00 | J250 Jackman Law Building
See EVENT POSTER here.
On September 10, 2018 Superior Court Justice Edward Belobaba ruled that Premier Doug Ford’s Bill 5 – the so-called Better Local Government Act – to reduce Toronto’s city council from 47 wards to 25, breached s. 2(b) of the Charter and was therefore unconstitutional. Shortly thereafter Premier Ford announced that not only was his government going to appeal the court’s decision, but he was going to invoke the Constitution’s “notwithstanding clause” for the first time in Ontario’s history to override the judge’s decision. The revised Bill has been introduced in the legislature with debates lasting into the late night; while a stay application, pending the appeal of the court decision, has been scheduled for Tuesday, September 18th.
The David Asper Centre for Constitutional Rights is convening a moderated panel discussion in order to unpack the various legal issues involved in this unprecedented case. Panel members will include two of our faculty’s Constitutional Law Professors Lorraine Weinrib and Yasmin Dawood, and litigator Steven Barrett of Goldblatt Partners LLP.
Please join us on Thursday September 20, 2018 at 4:30pm-6:00pm in J250 Jackman Law Building, for this timely event.
Email tal.schreier@utoronto.ca for information.
No Registration Required.

Your Right to Know: an Access to Information Workshop for Legal Research and Advocacy
2018-09-26 12:30 - 14:00 | J140 Jackman Law Building, 78 Queen's Park Cres, Toronto, Ontario, M5S 2C5, Canada
Your Right to Know: an Access to Information Workshop for Legal Research and Advocacy
Every Canadian has the right to request information from federal, provincial/territorial and municipal governments. Access to information from our government underpins society’s most important democratic ideals, including government accountability, freedom of expression and press freedom. Many organizations even characterize access to information as a fundamental human right.
We are convening a lunchtime panel on September 26th 2018 at 12:30 – 2:00 in J140 focused on the use of ATI (Access to Information) and FOI (Freedom of Information) requests.
This moderated panel will focus on the importance and uses of ATI and FOI requests, best practices for filing ATI requests, and limitations/challenges with the ATI regime in Canada. A Q & A period will follow the panel. Panel members will include:
Dara Lambie, Legal Counsel for the Office of the Information and Privacy Commissioner/Ontario
Alex Luscombe, PhD student in the Centre for Criminology and Sociolegal Studies at the University of Toronto and a Junior Fellow at Massey College, works to advance the use of FOI requests as a method of data production in the social sciences. With Prof Kevin Walby, he has written about FOI and theory, FOI and standards of validity/reliability, FOI and comparative research, and FOI and research ethics.
Michael Power, Toronto Lawyer and Adjunct Professor at Osgoode Hall Law School, author of Halsbury’s Laws of Canada, Access to Information and Privacy and Sailing in Dangerous Waters: A Director’s Guide to Data Governance.
A light lunch will be provided. No Registration Required.
Please note: A longer “hands-on” session will be held later in the year, where law students, faculty members and other scholars can bring their draft access to information requests or research questions for assistance. Date TBD.
Email tal.schreier@utoronto.ca for further information

Asper Centre's 10th Anniversary Celebration
2018-10-17 17:00 - 19:00 | Jackman Law Building, Faculty of Law, University of Toronto, 78 Queens Park
View the event photo gallery
Read our “Celebrating 10 Years” Magazine
Read the Asper Centre’s 2017 – 2018 annual report
Watch the video of the event on YouTube
It’s been a full decade since the Asper Centre for Constitutional Rights opened its doors!
To celebrate 10 years of dedicated advocacy, education and research, former Supreme Court of Canada Justice Thomas Cromwell will moderate a conversation between Mary Eberts and Joseph Arvay, two of our former Constitutional Litigators-in-Residence
on October 17, 2018 at 5:00pm
Reception to follow
The Honourable Thomas Albert Cromwell, C.C. received law degrees from Queen’s and Oxford, practised law in Kingston and Toronto and taught law at Dalhousie University. During his time at Dalhousie, he was active as a labour arbitrator and served as Vice-chair of the Nova Scotia Labour Relations Board. After serving as Executive Legal Officer to the Chief Justice Canada from 1992 – 1995, he was appointed a judge of the Nova Scotia Court of Appeal in 1997, serving there until his appointment as a judge of the Supreme Court of Canada in 2008. Mr. Cromwell was the first recipient of the Canadian Bar Association’s Louis St. Laurent Award of Excellence and is an honorary fellow of Exeter College, Oxford and of the American College of Trial Lawyers. A holder of four honorary doctorates in law, he has also had an award established in his name at the Queen’s Faculty of Law, The Honourable Thomas Cromwell Award for Public Service. He is the chair of the Action Committee on Access to Justice in Civil and Family Matters, a director of the International Centre for Criminal Law Reform and Criminal Justice and of Access Pro Bono British Columbia. He retired from the Supreme Court of Canada on September 1st, 2016. A member of the Bars of Nova Scotia, Ontario and British Columbia, he now serves as senior counsel with Borden Ladner Gervais LLP in Ottawa and Vancouver. He is a recipient of the Canadian Institute for the Administration of Justice’s Justice Medal and of the Medal of the International Society for the Reform of Criminal Law. In 2017, was named a Companion of the Order of Canada for his “illustrious service as a Supreme Court justice, and for his leadership in improving access to justice for all Canadians.” In 2018, he was named by the Canadian Lawyer Magazine as of one Canada’s most influential lawyers.

Mary Eberts received her legal education at Western and the Harvard Law School, and is a member of the Bar of Ontario. She joined a Bay St. law firm after several years of teaching at the Faculty of Law, University of Toronto, and was a partner at that firm until opening a small firm specializing in Charter and public law litigation. From this base in Toronto, she has appeared as counsel to parties and interveners in the Supreme Court of Canada, Courts of Appeal and Superior Courts in Ontario and other provinces, the Federal Court and Court of Appeal, and before administrative tribunals and inquests in Ontario and other provinces. She was active in securing the present language of section 15 of the Charter, and was one of the founders of the Women’s Legal Education and Action Fund (LEAF). Since 1991, she has been litigation counsel to the Native Women’s Association of Canada (NWAC). Mary held the Gordon Henderson Chair in Human Rights at the University of Ottawa in 2004-2005 and the Ariel Sallows Chair in Human Rights at the College of Law, University of Saskachewan in 2011 and 2012, where she taught courses in test case litigation. Mary was the Constitutional Litigator in Residence in 2014-15 and a McMurty Fellow at Osgoode Hall Law School in 2015-16. Recognition of her work includes the Law Society Medal, the Governor-General’s Award in Honour of the Persons’ Case, the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee Medal and several honourary degrees. In 2017, Mary was made an Officer of the Order of Canada. She is currently a Senior Fellow at Massey College, University of Toronto.
Joseph Arvay, who co-founded the firm of Arvay Finlay Barristers in 1990 with offices in Vancouver and Victoria, is recognized as one of this country’s most highly respected lawyers. His practice emphasizes constitutional and administrative law matters, as well as Indigenous rights litigation.. He has been counsel in scores of important Supreme Court of Canada cases. His exceptional commitment to human rights in this country has been recognized with numerous awards and tributes. He was awarded honourary doctorates of law from both York University and the University of Victoria. In 2017 he was named an Officer of the Order of Canada as well as a Member of the Order of British Columbia.

Information Session for UTLaw students wishing to work at the Asper Centre
2018-11-12 12:30 - 14:00 | J140 Jackman Law Building, 78 Queen's Park Cres, Toronto, Ontario, M5S 2C5, Canada
For University of Toronto Faculty of Law 1L and 2L JD Candidates ONLY
On Monday November 12, 2018 at 12:30pm in J140, the Asper Centre will take part in an Information Session about the Faculty’s hiring process.
This will be an opportunity for students to learn about the work positions available at the Asper Centre, amongst other organizations.
Students will also hear about the application, and interview process, which takes place in the winter term.
Kindly RSVP for this program via UTLC, as space is limited.

Constitutional Roundtable with Professor Mark Tushnet
2019-01-23 12:30 - 14:00 | J130 Jackman law building, 78 Queen's Park, University of Toronto, Faculty of Law, Jackman Law Building Atrium, Toronto, Canada
On January 23, 2019, visiting Professor Mark Tushnet presented an Asper Centre Constitutional Roundtable on “Interpreting Unwritten Constitutional Norms: Court-Packing in the United States as a Case Study,” with University of Toronto Faculty of Law Professor Yasmin Dawood as discussant. This Roundtable is based on a chapter of Professor Tushnet’s forthcoming book (see chapter abstract below).

Professor Tushnet is a leading scholar of constitutional law and legal history and the William Nelson Cromwell Professor of Law at Harvard Law School. He graduated from Harvard College and Yale Law School and served as a law clerk to Justice Thurgood Marshall, and he specializes in constitutional law and theory, including comparative constitutional law. His research includes studies examining (skeptically) the practice of judicial review in the United States and around the world. He also writes in the area of legal and particularly constitutional history, with works on the development of civil rights law in the United States and (currently) a long-term project on the history of the Supreme Court in the 1930s.

Professor Dawood, J.D. (Columbia), Ph.D. (Chicago), is the Canada Research Chair in Democracy, Constitutionalism, and Electoral Law, and an Associate Professor at the University of Toronto Faculty of Law. She is cross-appointed in the Department of Political Science. Professor Dawood specializes in election law, comparative constitutional law, and democratic theory. She has testified before Parliament as an election law expert, and been interviewed on election law issues by CBC Radio, The Agenda, and Power and Politics. Prior to joining the Faculty of Law she was a Postdoctoral Fellow at the Centre for Ethics, University of Toronto.

Abstract
This is a draft of a chapter in a forthcoming book, written for a general audience. The book’s overall argument is that the 2020 elections are likely to be an inflection point in American political development, ending what the book (and this Chapter) refer to as an interregnum after the decay of the Reagan Revolution. The 2020 elections may move the nation along a “Trumpist” path or a more strongly social democratic path than recent Democratic leaders have followed.
This chapter deals with the latter possibility. A prior chapter argues that the Supreme Court will be an obstacle to the programs that would be developed along the “social democratic” path (because it will remain dominated by conservative Republican justices), and that Democrats should prepare responses to that problem.
Chapter 13 outlines some of those responses, the most important of which is Court-packing. It addresses the argument that there is now a constitutional convention against Court-packing, suggesting that there may be no such norm, but only a practice of non-expansion because there was no need to expand the Court earlier. It then deals with the claim that Court-packing would undermine judicial legitimacy, arguing that the U.S. Supreme Court might not have much legitimacy (understood as deference to judicial decisions simply because they emanate from the Court) and that any marginal effect on legitimacy is likely to be small.

Constitutional Roundtable with Professor Kent Roach
2019-02-05 12:30 - 14:00 | J140 Jackman Law Building, 78 Queen's Park Cres, Toronto, Ontario, M5S 2C5, Canada
On Tuesday, February 5, 2019, University of Toronto Faculty of Law Professor Kent Roach presented a Constitutional Roundtable titled “Canadian Justice, Indigenous Injustice: The Gerald Stanley/Colten Boushie Case.”
In this Constitutional Roundtable, Gerald Stanley’s trial for the killing of Colten Boushie, a 22 year old Cree man, will be examined in its broader historical, political and legal context with attention to the role of equality rights in jury selection and trial procedures. The jury selection reforms proposed in Bill C-75 will also be examined as will the role of the RCMP and other policing services.
BIO
Kent Roach is Professor of Law and Prichard-Wilson Chair of Law and Public Policy at the Faculty of Law. He is a graduate of the University of Toronto and Yale University, and a former law clerk to Justice Bertha Wilson of the Supreme Court of Canada. He has served as research director in multiple inquiries, and represented Aboriginal and civil liberties groups in many interventions before the courts. In 2002, he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada, and in 2013 he was one of four academics awarded a Trudeau Fellowship.
No registration required. Light Lunch provided.

Constitutional Roundtable with Assistant Professor Y.Y. Chen
2019-02-28 12:30 - 14:00 | Jackman Law Building Room J140, 78 Queen’s Park
On Thursday February 28, 2019, Professor Y.Y. Chen presented a Constitutional Roundtable titled “Toward a Substantive Understanding of Citizenship in the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms,” considering how “citizens” should be interpreted in the Charter context and whether “immigration status” should be considered a protected ground under s. 15 of the Charter.
BIO
Y.Y. Brandon Chen (SJD candidate, MSW, JD, University of Toronto; BSc, Emory University) is an Assistant Professor at the University of Ottawa’s Faculty of Law, Common Law Section. A lawyer and social worker by training, Professor Chen’s research program examines laws and policies that contribute to health inequities and marginalization, particularly among noncitizens and racialized minorities. His published work has touched on such topics as health rights litigation, refugee health care, social determinants of health, health care solidarity, and medical tourism. Professor Chen currently teaches in areas of public law, constitutional law, health law, and immigration and refugee law.
ABSTRACT
Many long-term residents of Canada are legally categorized as non-citizens. The fact that non-citizens constitute a marginalized population whose interests are prone to be overlooked or compromised by governments has been recognized by the Supreme Court of Canada. Notwithstanding this, Canadian courts have so far adopted a relatively conservative stance when interpreting the applicability of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms to non-citizen residents. Particularly, courts have construed the Charter’s reference to the term “citizen” in a purely legalistic fashion, limiting the guarantees of voting rights, mobility rights and language rights to only those meeting the requirements stipulated in the Citizenship Act. In the same vein, under s 15 of the Charter, although courts have accepted citizenship as an analogous ground of protection against discrimination, case law shows that governmental distinction between different groups of non-citizens will generally not attract constitutional scrutiny. Such case law constrains non-citizens’ participation in society and deprives them of important legal recourse in cases of rights infringement despite their contribution and subjugation to the social cooperation process. Given these concerns, this paper advocates for an understanding of citizenship in the Charter context that is independent from its statutory definition. Specifically, drawing on a thriving body of social science literature on the subject, the paper argues that for the purpose of the Charter, citizenship should embody a non-binary, multi-dimensional conception of national membership that takes into account a person’s social ties, societal engagement and self-identification. As the Canadian society becomes ever more pluralistic, the adoption of this more nuanced understanding of citizenship represents a logical growth of the constitutional “living tree” and a more adequate constitutional safeguard of non-citizens’ rights.

No registration required. Light Lunch provided.

Immigration Detention Symposium
2019-03-15 09:00 - 15:00 | J140 Jackman Law Building, 78 Queen's Park Cres, Toronto, Ontario, M5S 2C5, Canada
On Friday March 15th 2019 the Asper Centre convened a one-day Immigration Detention Symposium focused on advancing litigation and advocacy strategies to address the challenges within Canada’s immigration detention system. This Symposium highlighted immigration practitioners’ and civil society’s current advocacy efforts, recommendations and resources for achieving meaningful solutions to the challenges.
The main objective of this Symposium was to bring together the relevant legal, research and advocacy partners who are focused on improving the serious deficiencies in the immigration detention system in Canada. We hope to help highlight some of the important responses and strategies currently being developed and implemented in this area, and that this opportunity for sharing and collaboration will encourage continued strategic litigation collaboration and coordinated advocacy efforts amongst the immigration bar and beyond.
View Symposium SCHEDULE here

Symposium RESOURCES
Panel I: Immigration Detention External Audit, IRB and Audit Response Report: Recommendations and Next Steps

Click on above image to VIEW a recording of this panel (captioned)
IRB External Audit
IRB Chairperson Guideline Detention, effective April 1 2019
Joint audit response report – forthcoming

Panel II: Habeas Corpus Best Practices

Anstis, Will, & Blum – Separate but Unequal
Habeas Procedure in Ontario by Jared Will
SCOTLAND – Notice of Application
HOQUE – Notice of Application
SCOTLAND – Court Order to Appear
SCOTLAND – Index and Covers

Panel III: CARL Toolkit and a Compendium of Relevant Case-Law for Immigration Detention Practitioners

CARL Immigration Detention TOOLKIT, March 2019
CARL Symposium Powerpoint Presentation March 15 2019
Asper Centre Federal Court Caselaw Compendium, August 2019
Asper Centre students, PowerPoint Presentation March 15 2019

Indigenous Family Law: A Panel Discussion on the Beaver v Hill case
2019-03-21 12:30 - 14:00 | J125 Jackman Law Building
The Asper Centre Indigenous Rights student working group is pleased to present a lunchtime panel discussion on Thursday March 21, 2019 at 12h30.
Brittany Beaver and Ken Hill are Haudenosaunee parents to a ten-year-old son. She is a student; he co-founded a successful cigarette company and earns millions of dollars each year. Their relationship ended in 2013, and Mr. Hill has since argued that Haudenosonee, not Ontario law, should guide his spousal and child support payments.
Three constitutional and family law practitioners will be discussing the case and related issues, including which families’ Indigenous legal systems should apply, and whether Indigenous self-governance can be an individual right or only a collective one.
Panelists are Scott Byers (Martha McCarthy & Co.), Jessica Orkin (Goldblatt Partners) and Judith Rae (Olthuis Kleer Townshend).
Professor Carol Rogerson will be moderating.
No registration required and light lunch will be provided.

Application Deadline for Clinical Legal Education course
2019-06-28 10:00
This course, available for current upper year JD candidates at the Faculty of Law only, explores substantive and procedural issues arising in advocating for constitutional rights through seminars and experiential learning. Students will be exposed to skills-building seminars and case work and explore some of the legal, procedural, strategic, ethical and theoretical dimensions of issues that arise in cases and other forms of legal advocacy. The program challenges students to examine issues in significant constitutional cases and advocacy initiatives in a critical way, while at the same time allowing them to develop the professional and ethical literacy which is essential to the practice of law. Through their clinical work, written reflections, and weekly seminars, students will test relationships between constitutional principles and the practical realities of the advocacy process, and develop a conceptual and empirical understanding of constitutional lawyering.
To register for the course, you must email a 1 page statement of interest to Cheryl Milne, cheryl.milne@utoronto.ca by Friday, June 28, 2019 at 10:00 am.
Applications will still be accepted after this date, but priority will be given to any applications received by June 28 at 10 am.

Call for Proposals for Student Working Groups 2019/20
2019-08-16
U of T law students can become involved in the Asper Centre’s work through volunteering with one of our student working groups. The working groups are student-led initiatives that bring together approximately 15 students to work in conjunction with academics, civil society groups or members of the bar on Charter rights advocacy or current constitutional law issues. The working groups receive support and guidance from the Asper Centre Director and Program Coordinator.
For information on how to apply to lead a Working Group read the Proposal Requirements in the Call for Proposals for 2019-20 Asper Centre Working Group. If you would like to apply but need some ideas or have some questions, please contact tal.schreier@utoronto.ca. The application is due on August 16, 2019.

Asper Centre & IHRP student working group Information and Sign-up session
2019-09-10 12:30 - 14:00 | J250 Jackman Law Building
For current JD students at UTLaw only

JD students in all years can volunteer with one of the Asper Centre student working groups, or IHRP student working groups that are led by upper year law students. Working groups draft policy briefs, organize workshops, and conduct research on emerging constitutional/charter rights issues and international human rights topics.
This year, the Asper Centre is pleased to support the following 4 working groups:

I. Right to Equality in Accommodation: Access to adequate, appropriate, and affordable housing is a growing problem for many people in Ontario, especially those from marginalized groups. Low vacancy rates make affordable housing more difficult to find, and also increase the potential for housing discrimination, because landlords can be highly selective. Section 21.1 of the Ontario Human Rights Code states that the right to equal treatment with respect to accommodation does not apply where an accommodation is in a dwelling where the occupants share a kitchen or bathroom with the landlord or their family. This means that Ontarians who would otherwise be protected from discrimination based on code grounds are not. This working group will be assisting CERA (the Centre for Equality Rights in Accommodation) by preparing a research memo on the exemption of shared residential accommodation from the human rights code, which will support CERA’s future goal of challenging the constitutionality of S. 21.1 of the Ontario Human Rights Code.
II. Sex Workers Rights: The Protection of Communities and Exploited Persons Act, SC 2014, c 25 [PCEPA] was introduced in response to the Supreme Court of Canada’s 2013 decision in Bedford v Canada, where the Court found that three Criminal Code provisions which criminalized components of sex work unjustifiably violated section 7 of the Charter and struck them down. The PCEPA includes new provisions that criminalize the purchase of sexual services in Canada and other related activities such as advertising the sale of sexual services. Sex worker organizations and constitutional experts believe that these new provisions remain unconstitutional because many of the harms identified in Bedford continue to be perpetuated. The continuation of these harms under a new legal context means that a new constitutional analysis is necessary. This working group will develop a comprehensive memo that provides information that could assist in a constitutional challenge of the post-Bedford sex work laws by key sex-worker organizations in Canada.
III. Refugee and Immigration Law: Recently, there have been incidents in which CBSA (Canadian Border Services Agency) officers have randomly conducted street checks in minority-populated Toronto neighbourhoods. In light of the United States ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement) raids and immigration camps, these events are extremely concerning. Thus, HALCO (the HIV/AIDS Legal Aid Clinic of Ontario) is looking to collaborate with our longstanding Refugee and Immigration working group to create a plain-language public legal information brochure detailing the powers of a CBSA agent and an individual’s rights when interacting with them. The working group will research and develop the brochure under the supervision of a staff immigration lawyer at HALCO.
IV. Climate Justice: November 18th, 2019 is ‘Student Law Clinic Global Day of Action for Climate Justice.’ The event organizers (GAJE, the Global Alliance for Justice Education) have asked participating student legal clinics to choose a project related to air pollution and complete it by or on November 18th to mark the date. This student working group will prepare an opinion piece on the Ontario government’s potential constitutional obligations with respect to regulating air pollution in Chemical Valley. The OpEd will urge the provincial government to honour its commitment to evaluating the impact of the new regulations in the winter of 2019-2020, and to recognize the role it can and should play in protecting environmental rights. In the second term, the group will have the opportunity to brainstorm and work together on another climate justice/constitutional law related project.

Learn more at O-week Clubs Fair (September 5th) and at the Information & Sign Up session on Tuesday September 10, 2019 at 12:30 in J250 (Moot Court).
PLEASE NOTE: to be eligible to sign up for one of the above working groups, you must attend the September 10th Information & Sign-up Session.

For more information, please email: tal.schreier@utoronto.ca

Asper Centre Research Assistant Position - Application Due Date
2019-09-23 12:00
The David Asper Centre for Constitutional Rights is seeking a research assistant to undertake the Asper Centre’s contribution to the Media Freedom Project led by the International Human Rights Program. This position requires excellent library research skills, strong computer skills, attention to detail and a demonstrated interest in constitutional law.
Qualifications: Candidates must be a current 2L, 3L, or a graduate student in law
Remuneration: The hourly rate for this position is expected to be $25.00 – $30.00 per hour (plus 4% vacation pay), depending upon qualifications, and subject to deductions required by law
To apply, please send a cover letter, resume, undergraduate and law school transcripts, and a brief writing sample by email to cheryl.milne@utoronto.ca by 12:00 p.m. on Monday, September 23, 2019.
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"Wealth, Equal Protection and Due Process" - A Constitutional Roundtable with Professor Brandon Garrett
2019-10-02 12:30 - 14:00 | J125 Jackman Law Building
With the University of Toronto Faculty of Law’s Associate Professor Vincent Chiao as Discussant
On Wednesday October 2, 2019 Professor Brandon Garrett presented a Constitutional Roundtable titled “Wealth, Equal Protection and Due Process” based on his paper. Professor Vincent Chiao was the discussant.
Professor Garrett joined the Duke University School of Law faculty in 2018 as the inaugural L. Neil Williams, Jr. Professor of Law. A leading scholar of criminal justice outcomes, evidence, and constitutional rights, Garrett previously was the White Burkett Miller Professor of Law and Public Affairs and Justice Thurgood Marshall Distinguished Professor of Law at the University of Virginia. Professor Garrett’s current research and teaching interests focus on forensic science, eyewitness identification, corporate crime, constitutional rights and habeas corpus, and criminal justice policy. His work has been widely cited by courts, including the U.S. Supreme Court, lower federal courts, state supreme courts, and courts in other countries, such as the Supreme Courts of Canada and Israel. Garrett also frequently speaks about criminal justice matters before legislative and policy making bodies, groups of practicing lawyers, law enforcement, and to local and national media. He is involved with a number of law reform initiatives, including the American Law Institute’s project on policing, for which he serves as Associate Reporter.
Professor Vincent Chiao, B.A. (University of Virginia), Ph.D. (Northwestern), J.D. (Harvard), is an Associate Professor in the Faculty of Law of the University of Toronto. He researches and teaches primarily in the area of criminal law and criminal justice, with a particular interest in the philosophical examination of its doctrine and institutions. He is the author of Criminal Law in the Age of the Administrative State (Oxford University Press 2018). He is also responsible for overseeing the Faculty of Law’s appellate criminal law externship, which provides selected third year JD students with the opportunity to work directly on criminal appeals, including before the Ontario Court of Appeal and the Supreme Court of Canada.
ABSTRACT: Increasingly, constitutional litigation challenging wealth inequality focuses on the intersection of the Equal Protection and Due Process Clauses. That intersection—between equality and due process—deserves far more careful exploration. What I call “equal process” claims arise from a line of Supreme Court and lower court cases in which wealth inequality is the central concern. For example, the Supreme Court in Bearden v. Georgia conducted analysis of a claim that criminal defendants were treated differently based on wealth in which due process and equal protection principles converged. That equal process connection is at the forefront of a wave of national litigation concerning some of the most pressing civil rights issues of our time, including:the constitutionality of fines, fees, and costs; detention of immigrants and criminal defendants for inability to pay cash bail; loss of voting rights; and a host of other ways in which the indigent face both unfair process and disparate burdens. I argue that an intersectional “equal process” approach to these cases better reflects both longstanding constitutional doctrine and the practical stakes in such litigation. If courts properly understand this connection between inequality and unfair process, they will design more suitable and effective remedies. More broadly, scholars have bemoaned how the Court turned away from class based heightened scrutiny in equal protection doctrine. Equal process theory has the potential to reinvigorate the Fourteenth Amendment as a guardian against unfair process and discrimination that increases inequality in society.
Please email tal.schreier@utoronto.ca for further information.
Light lunch will be provided and No RSVP required

Asper/IHRP Summer 2020 Fellowship Information Session
2019-10-30 12:30 - 13:30 | Jackman Law Building, Faculty of Law, University of Toronto 78 Queen’s Park, Room J140, 78 Queen's Park, Toronto, Ontario, Canada
For current JD students @UTLaw >> please attend this information session to learn more about the Asper Centre and the International Human Rights Program’s Summer Fellowship opportunities.
Date: Wednesday Oct 30, 2019
Venue: J140 Jackman Law Building
Time: 12:30pm

More details about the Asper Centre Fellowship program may be found here.

Constitutional Roundtable with Carissima Mathen
2019-11-13 12:30 - 14:00 | J125 Jackman Law Building
The Asper Centre Constitutional Roundtable Series Presents
Carissima Mathen
Professor, University of Ottawa Faculty of Law, Common Law section
on
Wednesday, November 13, 2019
12:30 – 2:00
J125, Jackman Law Building
78 Queen’s Park
“Courts Without Cases: The Law and Politics of Advisory Opinions”
with UTLaw’s Professor Lorraine Weinrib as Discussant
Carissima Mathen is a law professor at the University of Ottawa. She is an expert in the Constitution of Canada, criminal law and U.S. Constitutional Law. She has a special interest in the Supreme Court of Canada, judicial review, the separation of powers, criminal justice, and the relationship between law and social media. She publishes and lectures frequently in these areas.
She is committed to making complex legal issues understandable to broad audiences, explaining the law in accessible and interesting ways. She is regularly sought-out as a media commentator on legal issues, appearing on national and international television, radio and in print. A frequent blogger and tweeter, she pioneered the practice of live-tweeting from the Supreme Court of Canada.
Professor Mathen’s new book, Courts Without Cases: The Law and Politics of Advisory Opinions (Hart) was released on April 18, 2019. Her Constitutional Roundtable will cover the main themes of this book, with a focus on Chapter 4 which deals with separation of powers. Read the book’s Introduction and Chapter 4 here.
The following is an excerpt from Prof Mathen’s website: “When one thinks of courts, it most often is in the context of deciding cases: live disputes involving spirited, adversarial debate between opposing parties. Sometimes, though, a court is granted the power to answer questions in the absence of cases. In Canada since 1875, courts have been permitted to act as advisors alongside their ordinary, adjudicative role. These proceedings, known as references or advisory opinions, are the subject of my book. I argue that references raise numerous important questions: about the judicial role, about the relationship between courts and those who seek their “advice”, and about the nature of law.
Courts Without Cases offers the first detailed examination of that role from a legal perspective. Tracking their use in Canada since the country’s Confederation, and looking to the experience in other legal systems, I discuss how advisory opinions draw courts into the complex relationship between law and politics.
The book has been described as “lucid, original, insightful and highly readable” (Justice Lorne Sossin) and “a brilliant contribution to the literature on Canadian constitutional law and politics” (Professor Mark Walters).”

Professor Lorraine E. Weinrib was appointed to the Faculty of Law and the Department of Political Science in 1988. Previously, she worked in the Crown Law Office – Civil, Ministry of the Attorney General (Ontario), holding the position of Deputy Director of Constitutional Law and Policy at the time of her departure. Her work included legal advice and policy development on constitutional issues, as well as extensive litigation, frequently in the Supreme Court of Canada.

Light Lunch Provided
For further details, please contact tal.schreier@utoronto.ca
No Registration Required

Asper Centre Public Interest Lunch - Substantive Equality in Sentencing
2020-01-22 12:30 - 14:00 | J125 Jackman Law Building
The Asper Centre recently intervened in two cases before the Ontario Court of Appeal involving the criminal sentencing of marginalized people. Despite the Supreme Court of Canada’s aspirations in Gladue, Indigenous people in Canada continue to be criminalized and incarcerated at alarming rates. In particular, the over representation of Indigenous women in prisons has increased substantially over the past 10 years. Though their historical circumstances are different, Black Canadians also experience significant systemic discrimination and bias when dealing with police, in the courts, and in corrections.
In R v Sharma, the Asper Centre and the Women’s Legal Education and Action Fund (LEAF) jointly intervened on a constitutional challenge to ss. 742.1(c) and (e)(ii) of the Criminal Code, which eliminates conditional sentences for certain offences. Ms. Sharma is an Indigenous biracial woman who was convicted of a drug importation offence who, but for these provisions, would have been a suitable candidate for a conditional sentence.
In R v Morris, the Asper Centre intervened to suggest a framework for how to consider systemic factors in sentencing for Black Canadians. Mr. Morris was convicted of possession of illegal firearms. Upon sentencing, the judge was mindful of the social context in which Morris committed the offence with reference to reports from psychologists and social scientists with expertise on Black racism in Canada.
The Morris and Sharma cases illustrate how the overarching principle of substantive equality can illuminate sentencing decisions in cases involving marginalized people. Substantive equality is a constitutional imperative that requires courts to analyze the potentially discriminatory impact of laws with regard to their social, political, and legal context. Substantive equality plays a vital role in the criminal justice system, including at the sentencing stage. These cases suggest that sentencing judges should be mindful of systemic discrimination at all stages of the process and the ways in which that discrimination might have impacted the individual or their circumstances.
On January 22, 2020, the Asper Centre will convene a panel discussion about these two interventions in which the panelists will discuss to what extent historical disadvantage can be considered in sentencing and more broadly in the criminal justice system, in order to achieve substantive equality for marginalized groups.
The panelists will include Jessica Orkin (Goldblatt Partners, counsel for Asper Centre in Sharma), Nader Hasan (Stockwoods LLP, counsel for Asper Centre in Morris) and Emily Hill (Aboriginal Legal Services, Intervener in Sharma and Morris).
Read the Asper Centre’s intervener facta in Sharma and Morris.
For further information, contact tal.schreier@utoronto.ca
-light lunch will be provided-

Constitutional Law Career Panel
2020-02-12 12:30 - 14:00 | J125 Jackman Law Building
The David Asper Centre for Constitutional Rights presents a
CONSTITUTIONAL LAW CAREER PANEL
On February 12, 2020 at 12:30pm-2:00pm
Are you a JD Candidate with a passion for promoting our Constitutional and Charter rights?
Do you want to learn about the numerous career paths that exist for law graduates wishing to practice in the field of Charter litigation or Constitutional Law?
Meet and get advice from four practicing lawyers (including UTLaw & Asper Centre alumni) who are currently working in their fields of passion:
Emily Chan – Staff Lawyer, Litigation and Community Development, Justice for Children and Youth
Sinéad Dearman – Associate, Olthuis Kleer Townshend LLP
Geetha Philipupillai – Associate, Goldblatt Partners
Padraic Ryan – Counsel, Constitutional Law Branch, Ministry of the Attorney General of Ontario
J125—Jackman Law Building
* Pizza lunch provided * No Registration Required *

Morris A. Gross Memorial Lecture - Jean Teillet
2020-02-27 16:30 - 18:00 | P120 Jackman Law Building
The Morris A. Gross Memorial Lecture was established in memory of the late Morris A. Gross by the law firm Minden Gross LLP and by members of his family, friends and professional associates. The intention of the lectureship is to, every two years, bring to the Faculty of Law a distinguished scholar or a member of the practicing bar or bench for discussion with the student body and Faculty, and to deliver the bi-annual Morris A. Gross Memorial Lecture.
This year, the Morris A. Gross Memorial Lecture was delivered by Jean Teillet on February 27, 2020. The title for the lecture is “The Overstory & the Understory: Reconciling Justice and the Rule of Law with Canada’s Indigenous Peoples.”
Jean Teillet is the great-grandniece of Louis Riel and an Indigenous rights lawyer. She is the author of Métis Law in Canada and The North-West is Our Mother: The Story of Louis Riel’s People, the Métis Nation.
* Open to the Public * For further information, please contact tal.schreier@utoronto.ca *
View the webcast of the lecture here

Application Due Date: Summer Research Assistant Position
2020-05-04 12:00
The Asper Centre, jointly with the International Human Rights Program (IHRP), is seeking a Research Assistant for approximately 6 weeks this summer.

The Research Assistant will be primarily responsible for drafting a Symposium report in relation to the IHRP/Asper Centre Canadian
Media Freedom Symposium held in March 2020 at the law school (read more here). Tasks include summarizing key findings, synthesizing notes and legal materials produced for the Media Freedom Symposium, conducting legal research, drafting the report, and communicating frequently with supervisors on edits, formatting, and timeline.
Applicants for this position must be enrolled in the JD or LLM programs at the Faculty of Law or are expecting to graduate this spring in these programs.
Interested applicants should send a cover letter, resume, and writing sample to Cheryl Milne (cheryl.milne@utoronto.ca) and Vincent Wong (vince.wong@utoronto.ca) by May 4th, 2020 at noon.

Clinic Information Session
2020-06-24 17:00 - 18:00
This information session, for University of Toronto Faculty of Law upper year students, will provide details on how to enroll in the for-credit clinical programs at the faculty including the Asper Centre Constitutional Rights Clinic, Downtown Legal Services, the International Human Rights Program Clinic and the Investor Protection Clinic.
The following Directors will present at the information session and there will be an opportunity to ask questions.
Cheryl Milne, Asper Centre
Lisa Cirillo, Downtown Legal Services
Petra Molnar, International Human Rights Program
Ivy Lam, Investor Protection Clinic
Students, please check the internal events calendar listing through E-legal for the webinar link. THANKS!

WEBINAR: COVID-19 Contact Tracing and the Canadian Constitution
2020-07-29 12:00 - 13:30
The David Asper Centre for Constitutional Rights & the Schwartz Reisman Institute for Technology and Society were pleased to co-present
COVID-19 Contact Tracing and the Canadian Constitution
a FREE WEBINAR on Wednesday July 29, 2020 @12:00-1:30pm
Contact tracing apps play an important role alongside human tracing in our public health response to the COVID-19 pandemic. In order to ensure that contact tracing apps infringe our Constitutional rights as little as possible, however, the apps must be carefully constructed and the information they collect must be safeguarded. In a highly collaborative research paper entitled “Test, Trace, and Isolate: COVID-19 and the Canadian Constitution,” a team of experts from the University of Toronto, York University and the Ontario Tech University reviewed the benefits and limitations of using contact tracing apps to identify people who have been exposed to COVID-19.
In this webinar, the paper’s authors Lisa Austin (pictured), Vincent Chiao, David Lie (pictured), and Andrea Slane took part in a group discussion, led by Asper Centre Executive Director Cheryl Milne, about their research and conclusions including: the usefulness of contact tracing apps, the privacy choices involved in the technical design of these apps, which app the government has selected to use and why, as well as the privacy impacts considered under the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, which provides a framework for balancing competing rights and interests.
The panelists will be available for questions at the end of their discussion. An electronic copy of the paper is available here. Email tal.schreier@utoronto.ca for inquiries.
WEBINAR RECORDING LINK
Authors’ BIOS
Lisa Austin BA &Sc (McMaster) 1994, MA (Toronto) 1995, LLM (Toronto) (1998), PhD (Toronto) 2005, called to the Bar of Ontario in 2006, is a Professor of Law and the Chair in Law and Technology at the University of Toronto Faculty of Law. She is a co-founder of the IT3 Law at the University of Toronto, which engages in interdisciplinary research on privacy and transparency. Professor Austin’s research and teaching interests include privacy law, property law, and legal theory. She is published in such journals as Legal Theory, Law and Philosophy, Theoretical Inquiries in Law, Canadian Journal of Law and Jurisprudence, and Canadian Journal of Law and Society. Professor Austin’s privacy work has been cited numerous times by Canadian courts, including the Supreme Court of Canada.
Vincent Chiao, B.A. (University of Virginia), Ph.D. (Northwestern), J.D. (Harvard), is an Associate Professor in the Faculty of Law of the University of Toronto. He researches and teaches primarily in the area of criminal law and criminal justice, with a particular interest in the philosophical examination of its doctrine and institutions. He is the author of Criminal Law in the Age of the Administrative State (Oxford University Press 2018). He is also responsible for overseeing the Faculty of Law’s appellate criminal law externship, which provides selected third year JD students with the opportunity to work directly on criminal appeals, including before the Ontario Court of Appeal and the Supreme Court of Canada.
Dr. Beth Coleman is Associate Professor of Data & Cities at the Institute of Communication, Culture, Information and Technology and Faculty of Information, University of Toronto, where she directs the City as Platform lab. Working in the disciplines of Science and Technology Studies and Critical Race Theory, her research focuses on smart technology & machine learning, urban data, and civic engagement. She is the author of Hello Avatar and multiple articles addressing issues of smart cities, urban data, augmentation & experience design, and critical race, among others. She has presented at leading international conferences and municipal contexts such as CHI; Sharing Cities, Barcelona; Gender and Cities, Geneva; Mars/Waterfront Toronto. Her research affiliations include the Berkman Klein Center for Internet & Society, Harvard University; Microsoft Research; Data & Society Institute, New York; and expert consultant for the European Commission Digital Futures. She is one of the foundational directors of Thriving Cities, Mistletoe Singapore. Her previous academic positions include the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and University of Waterloo.
David Lie received his BASc from the University of Toronto in 1998, and his MS and PhD from Stanford University in 2001 and 2004 respectively. He is currently Professor in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at the University of Toronto.  He also holds appointments in the Department of Computer Science, the Faculty of Law and is a research lead with the Schwartz Riesman Institute for Technology and Society.  He is known for his seminal work on the XOM architecture, which was an early precursor to modern trusted execution processor architectures such as ARM Trustzone and Intel SGX.  He was the recipient of a best paper award at SOSP for this work. David is also a recipient of the MRI Early Researcher Award, Connaught Global Challenge Award.  He developed the PScout Android Permission mapping tool, whose datasets have been downloaded over 10,000 times and used in dozens of subsequent papers.  David has served on various program committees including OSDI, Usenix Security, IEEE Security & Privacy, NDSS and CCS.  Currently, his interests are focused on securing mobile platforms, cloud computing security and bridging the divide between technology and policy.
Martha Shaffer is a Professor at the University of Toronto Faculty of Law, which she joined in 1990. She holds law degrees from Harvard and Toronto, as well as an undergraduate degree from Harvard. She served as Law Clerk to the Supreme Court of Canada for Chief Justice Brian Dickson, before becoming the Boulton Junior Fellow at the Faculty of Law, McGill University. Professor Shaffer’s principal research and teaching interests concentrate on criminal law, family law and equality issues.
Dr. Andrea Slane joined Ontario Tech University’s Faculty of Social Science and Humanities in 2009 as an Associate Professor in the Legal Studies program. She is also the Associate Dean of Research and Graduate Programs, Legal Studies. Her research focuses on privacy, data protection, and the variety of legal regimes that protect people from both individual and commercial wrongdoing online and over digital devices. She has a substantial body of work on the appropriate means to regulate the flow of personal information, whether between individuals; individuals and businesses; businesses and government; business to business; or to the public. She has also conducted sociological research on the views of professionals who work with victims of online child sexual exploitation, and is currently engaged in a new project examining senior citizens’ views toward new social support technologies such as digital assistants and social robots, and the kinds of protections they feel they need.
François Tanguay-Renaud is a Professor of Law and the Director of York University’s Jack & Mae Nathanson Centre on Transnational Human Rights, Crime and Security since 2012. He is also one of the founders and first Director of York’ University’s Juris Doctor/Master of Arts (JD/MA) combined program in law and philosophy, the founder and main administrator of the Ontario Legal Philosophy Partnership (OLPP) and a former Associate Dean Research, Graduate Studies, and Institutional Relations. Professor Tanguay-Renaud holds degrees in both civil and common law from McGill University, where he was both a Loran Scholar and a Greville-Smith Scholar. He also studied at the National University of Singapore, and completed his graduate work (BCL, MPhil, DPhil) at the University of Oxford. Professor Tanguay-Renaud ‘s current academic interests span a wide range of subject areas — but notably, criminal law, criminal procedure, constitutional law, emergency law, and public international law — viewed mostly through the lens of analytical legal theory.
