[Canada] Canadian Politics Redux

[Jacob]

I agree with Trudeau that Poilievre is going to be bad for Canada, but I agree with Beeb that it's going to be a challenge to go against the entrenched narrative between now and the election.

[Sheilbh]

So I'm not a political professional - just an interested amateur.  But I've heard this talk numerous times - that bad poll numbers are just a communications issue - if we could just explain our position to the public then they'd support us!

Yeah I  think this is a really common delusion and is basically almost always a sign of a moribund government (or opposition) project.

[viper37]

Danielle Smith: Alberta welcomes newcomers, but only if they 'possess our shared values' 

Well, well, well.

First, she says Quebec is racist, than she wants to go even further than us.

Ah, Canadian politicians.

[Grey Fox]

Of only they were willing to work with us instead of crying about péréquation.

[viper37]

Of only they were willing to work with us instead of crying about péréquation.

Can't blame the snake from biting you when you help it, apparently.

[Barrister]

I'll be damned if I can find it now, but there was an election result predictor based on a (single but reliable) poll that had the Liberals in 4th place, after the Conservatives, NDP and Bloc (in that order).  Not saying it's likely, not saying it's going to happen...

Also saw a lot of heat over this story:

Ottawa, Quebec pool $2.5B to build satellites for better internet in remote areas
Satellite operator Telesat and producer MDA in Montreal's West Island get contracts

Morgan Lowrie · The Canadian Press · Posted: Sep 13, 2024 2:46 PM MDT | Last Updated: September 13
People are walking around a facility.
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Quebec Premier François Legault tour the MDA satellite manufacturing centre, which is located in Saint-Anne-de-Bellevue, Que. (Ryan Remiorz/The Canadian Press)
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The Canadian government on Friday announced a loan of $2.14 billion to satellite operator Telesat to help the company build its broadband satellite constellation, in what Prime Minister Justin Trudeau described as Canada's largest ever space program.

Quebec's government, meanwhile, announced a loan of $400 million to the company, which has contracted aerospace technology firm MDA to build its satellites in Sainte-Anne-de-Bellevue, Que.

Speaking to reporters Friday at MDA's facility in Montreal's West Island, Trudeau said the Telesat Lightspeed low Earth orbit broadband satellite constellation will enable people in the most remote parts of the country, including in Indigenous communities and in areas with mining and forestry operations, to connect with cheaper, more reliable internet.

"That's what this investment is about," he said.

"Yes, it's about investing in satellites and space and all sorts of really cool stuff," Trudeau said. "But it's fundamentally about making sure that Canadians and people in more distant communities, in smaller northern communities and in remote parts of the world can be connected to the transformation and the progress that the world is seeing at increasingly destabilizing speeds."

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/montreal/satellite-billions-federal-provincial-government-loan-1.7323145

Full story in the link.  Canada gives $2.1 bil loan to Telesat (plus additional grants from Quebec gov.) to secure Canadian satellite-based internet for rural and northern areas.

So look, I've lived in northern areas.  It's by now awhile ago, but coming from down south it's kind of freaky that once you get beyond the communities itself there's just nothing.  No internet, no cell service.  So certainly in the public interest to help those communities in that way.

But of course Elon Musk can't help but stick his nose in it.  Someone asks "hey wouldn't StarLink be cheaper?" to which he replies yes - probably half the cost.  StarLink is available now, while this doesn't have the first satellite launch until 2026.

Liberals (correctly!) point out that they don't want to rely on a foreign company, and that StarLink has cut service at times in Ukraine.  Problem is Telesat is a foreign company as well.  If we really wanted a made-in-Canada solution that would probably have to include launch capabilities and cost a lot more than $2 billion.  LIke a LOT more.

Liberals tout the job creation - but $2.1 billion for $2,000 jobs is like a million dollars per job.

[Barrister]

https://winnipegsun.com/news/ndp-remove-lawyer-from-caucus-for-partners-representation-of-nygard

https://winnipeg.ctvnews.ca/manitoba-ndp-mla-booted-from-caucus-due-to-business-partner-acting-as-peter-nygard-s-lawyer-1.7039901

So the NDP Premier of Manitoba, Wab Kinew, kicks out NDP MLA Mark Wasyliw, a lawyer, because Wasyliw's former law firm partner (who goes un-named) is representing fashion executive Peter Nygard on multiple criminal charges (including sexual assault).

I was searching around to see if maybe that wasn't quite true - but apparently it comes right from the NDP press release.

The second news article suggests maybe there was something else going on - but if something else is going on you then decide to justify your decision because the lawyer's partner is representing someone accused of something bad?  Wow.

Wasyliw is evidently NOT impressed.  Kinew, and the Manitoba NDP, have no further comment.

I am almost certainly the only one on Languish who will care about this, but I was outraged enough I had to say something to someone.  You all are lucky enough to be the beneficiaries. 

[Sheilbh]

Is there something like the cab rank rule in Canada that might apply?

[Barrister]

Is there something like the cab rank rule in Canada that might apply?

I had to google this.

The "cab rank rule" is that any barrister MUST accept a retainer if they are otherwise competent in a certain area.

There is no such equivalent.  A Canadian trial lawyer (which we call a barrister, even though we have a unified bar and every lawyer is simultaneously a barrister and a solicitor) is free to refuse a retainer if they see so fit.  I mean typical Human Rights legislation applies (you can't refuse a retainer of someone because of their racial heritage or what not) but it is certainly permissible for a barrister to say "I'm sorry, I don't take sexual assault cases".

In this it is much like doctors.  An doctor is not required to consider you for MAID - but then you should refer the client to someone who will.

But it's the more basic principle that just because a lawyer DOES represent someone - that doesn't mean the lawyer endorses what their client has done.  Even rapists deserve representation.  The lawyers who represented the Nazis at Nuremberg were rightly considered to be upholding the finest traditions of the profession - not Nazi apologists.

And of course it's double so if it's not just the lawyer themselves, but their former partner.

[viper37]

edit: BB was quicker

Is there something like the cab rank rule in Canada that might apply?

First come, first served: Revisiting the cab rank rule

In Britain, barristers are bound by the "cab rank" rule: barristers, like taxis, must accept work on a 'first-come, first-served' basis. Barristers must accept matters appropriate for their experience irrespective of the client's identity, the nature of the case, or "any belief or opinion which [they] may have formed as to the character, reputation, cause, conduct, guilt, or innocence of the client".

Canadian lawyers are not subject to the cab rank rule per se. We are entitled – in criminal and civil cases alike – to decline a retainer because we disagree with a client's cause or conduct, but our regulators discourage this.
The Model Code of Professional Conduct acknowledges a "right to decline representation", but encourages a cab rank approach, stating: "Generally, a lawyer should not exercise the right merely because a person seeking legal services or that person's cause is unpopular or notorious..."

The cab rank rule is designed to ensure that even unpopular parties can secure legal representation, and that lawyers who act for them are not unfairly criticized for doing so.

The courts, however, distinguish between lawyers representing unpopular parties, and lawyers advocating unreasonable positions. Indeed, lawyers who advance unreasonable positions may be vulnerable to costs awards against them personally.

[Sheilbh]

Cool - thanks. And in practice barristers here can, for example, find "professional reasons" or scheduling issues to decline a client (though their clerks may get pissed off if they do it too often).

But it's a helpful defence for barristers - for example Starmer has been attacked for representing terrorists in human rights cases and, rightly, been able to say he's a human rights lawyer and the cab rank rule applied. Same for, say, John Smith (Labour leader in the 90s) who still had a criminal practice as an MP including defending alleged murderers.

There's also been a controversy over barristers saying they won't act in for clients who harm the environment/are carbon emitters even though they are competent as potentially harming the rule. I'm not sure.

And absolutely agree on this case - at best it sounds like something else is going on and worth press digging into

[Sheilbh]

First come, first served: Revisiting the cab rank rule

In Britain, barristers are bound by the "cab rank" rule: barristers, like taxis, must accept work on a 'first-come, first-served' basis. Barristers must accept matters appropriate for their experience irrespective of the client's identity, the nature of the case, or "any belief or opinion which [they] may have formed as to the character, reputation, cause, conduct, guilt, or innocence of the client".

Thanks. Although I'd add on the guilt or innocence that actually finding out is a big issue because barristers can't mislead the court. So I have a friend who's a criminal barrister and more than once had a "FFS" moment when their client confessed to them but was pleading not guilty.

They had to recuse themselves for professional reasons because it's extremely limiting on the lines of argument they can advance in court

[viper37]

https://winnipegsun.com/news/ndp-remove-lawyer-from-caucus-for-partners-representation-of-nygard

https://winnipeg.ctvnews.ca/manitoba-ndp-mla-booted-from-caucus-due-to-business-partner-acting-as-peter-nygard-s-lawyer-1.7039901

So the NDP Premier of Manitoba, Wab Kinew, kicks out NDP MLA Mark Wasyliw, a lawyer, because Wasyliw's former law firm partner (who goes un-named) is representing fashion executive Peter Nygard on multiple criminal charges (including sexual assault).

I was searching around to see if maybe that wasn't quite true - but apparently it comes right from the NDP press release.

The second news article suggests maybe there was something else going on - but if something else is going on you then decide to justify your decision because the lawyer's partner is representing someone accused of something bad?  Wow.

Wasyliw is evidently NOT impressed.  Kinew, and the Manitoba NDP, have no further comment.

I am almost certainly the only one on Languish who will care about this, but I was outraged enough I had to say something to someone.  You all are lucky enough to be the beneficiaries. 

I kind of find it stupid that he gets fired for what his former partners does.

As a MLA, he has no legal control over his former law partner.  And in any case, our judicial system presumes that everyone gets the best defense entitled.  Rapist, pedophiles, murderers, rich scumbags alike

[Barrister]

First come, first served: Revisiting the cab rank rule

In Britain, barristers are bound by the "cab rank" rule: barristers, like taxis, must accept work on a 'first-come, first-served' basis. Barristers must accept matters appropriate for their experience irrespective of the client's identity, the nature of the case, or "any belief or opinion which [they] may have formed as to the character, reputation, cause, conduct, guilt, or innocence of the client".

Thanks. Although I'd add on the guilt or innocence that actually finding out is a big issue because barristers can't mislead the court. So I have a friend who's a criminal barrister and more than once had a "FFS" moment when their client confessed to them but was pleading not guilty.

They had to recuse themselves for professional reasons because it's extremely limiting on the lines of argument they can advance in court

So I try to not get too "legal" on Twitter, but I thought I advanced what was a completely uncontroversial point - that if a client confesses to their lawyer the lawyer can still represent them, they can still argue for "not guilty", but only on the basis of "the Crown/government hasn't proved the case".  In particular - if you know your client is guilty you can't advance an affirmative defence like "no, it was actually Mr X who did this crime".

A whole bunch of US attorneys jumped down my throat like I was crazy - who cares what your client says, why would you believe them anyways, you have to do everything under your power to defend your client, etc.

I remember I was taught that this is actually a serious tactical decision to make between a client and lawyer - if the lawyer asks "OK so tell me what happened" you might get a really useful defence you want to pursue, or you might be limited in what you can do when your client confesses to you.


Slightly related - in my very brief defence counsel career I was representing a guy on refusing to provide a breath sample/drunk driving.  We potentially had a defence to the refusal charge.  I gleefully told me client "and then you can take the stand and tell them how you weren't drunk".  My client, who was more aware of legal ethics than I was that day, said "uhh... I can't do that".  I was like  yup I inadvertantly was trying to suborn perjury.

[Sheilbh]

So I try to not get too "legal" on Twitter, but I thought I advanced what was a completely uncontroversial point - that if a client confesses to their lawyer the lawyer can still represent them, they can still argue for "not guilty", but only on the basis of "the Crown/government hasn't proved the case".  In particular - if you know your client is guilty you can't advance an affirmative defence like "no, it was actually Mr X who did this crime".

A whole bunch of US attorneys jumped down my throat like I was crazy - who cares what your client says, why would you believe them anyways, you have to do everything under your power to defend your client, etc.

I remember I was taught that this is actually a serious tactical decision to make between a client and lawyer - if the lawyer asks "OK so tell me what happened" you might get a really useful defence you want to pursue, or you might be limited in what you can do when your client confesses to you.

So that's exactly my understanding too.

Basically you can undermine the prosecution's case but you can't really advance your own because you'd be misleading the court. But I've always slightly had the impression (purely based on US TV ) that doing your utmost for your client is the absolute obligation for a lawyer in the US. Here, and in Canada by the sounds of it, it's only one of your duties - you also can't mislead the court, can't engage in conduct that would bring the profession into disrepute etc. And if that creates a conflict between those duties then you need to step back for professional reasons.

Although obviously it plays out slightly differently for solicitors than barristers - because solicitors aren't actually advocating/speaking at the court except through witness statements.

Slightly related - in my very brief defence counsel career I was representing a guy on refusing to provide a breath sample/drunk driving.  We potentially had a defence to the refusal charge.  I gleefully told me client "and then you can take the stand and tell them how you weren't drunk".  My client, who was more aware of legal ethics than I was that day, said "uhh... I can't do that".  I was like  yup I inadvertantly was trying to suborn perjury.

Well I'm glad you avoided the downward slope to Saul Goodman.