n;Eli Lederman and Matthew
Sammon have joined Toronto’s
Lenczner Slaght Royce Smith
Griffin LLP as partners.
Lederman is a civil litigator
whose practice includes commercial litigation, professional
liability, securities and class
action cases. he acts as
counsel in commercial arbitrations and regularly appears
before different levels of court,
including the ontario Court of
superior Justice, the Court of
appeal for ontario and the
ontario human Rights Commission. sammon’s litigation practice includes corporate commercial litigation, professional
liability and employment law.
he has extensive trial experience in defense of physicians
and on behalf of individuals and
corporations in employment and
commercial matters.
n;Veteran tax lawyer John
Owen has joined Baker &
Mckenzie LLP as a partner in
the firm’s Toronto office,
bringing more than 25 years of
experience in handling a range
of transactional and litigation
tax matters. he advises public
and private corporations on a
wide range of Canadian income
tax issues and advises clients
faced with audits by and disputes with federal and provincial tax authorities. owen is the
latest addition to series of
prominent hires to the firm’s
tax practice. Tax litigator
Patricia Rexford and Joshua
Odintz, former senior advisor
for tax reform to the assistant
secretary at the U.s. Department of Treasury, joined the
firm in December.
n;Davis LLP continues to grow
nationally with the promotion of
five associates to the firm’s
partnership. in Vancouver, Dean
Dalke and Richard Lord will be
contributing to the firm’s litigation and real-estate practices. in
addition, Megan Filmer, Colin
Lipsett and Justin Mooney will
be joining the firm’s corporate
and commercial practice in
Vancouver, edmonton and
Toronto, respectively.
BY CRISTIN SCHMITZ
Ottawa is considering a provincial proposal to add special protection for matrimonial equalization
awards to the federal Bankruptcy
and Insolvency Act (BIA).
At the conclusion of three days
of wide-ranging discussion about
justice matters with his provincial
and territorial counterparts in
Charlottetown on Jan. 26, federal
Justice Minister Rob Nicholson
issued a communiqué pledging to
raise with his federal colleagues
in Ottawa the need identified by
provincial and territorial ministers “to amend the Bankruptcy
and Insolvency Act (BIA) to
ensure persons who declare bankruptcy are not relieved of obligations under provincial marital
property legislation.”
The bankruptcy reform issue
was spearheaded by the Manitoba Bar, including Manitoba
Justice Minister Andrew Swan,
in the wake of the Supreme Court
of Canada’s call to action last year
in the case of Schreyer v. Schreyer
2011 SCC 35.
That decision left a farm wife
empty-handed after 19 years of
marriage. She was unable to collect on her equalization payment,
due to her husband’s discharge
from bankruptcy. Yet the husband retained the entire family
farm (the family’s main asset, of
which he was the registered
owner) because under Manitoba
law, family farms are exempt
from execution by creditors.
From a fairness perspective,
“you’ve got to scratch your head
and say this doesn’t quite work,”
remarked Lawrence Pinsky of
Winnipeg’s Taylor McCaffrey,
who noted he was expressing a
personal opinion about the case.
The chair of the Manitoba Bar
Association’s family law section
said, however, that his group
would like the federal government to create a legislative fix as
soon as possible, after consultation with the family law Bar.
“We’ll certainly be … encouraging that those changes be
THE LAWYERS WEEKLY
VOL. 22, NO. 27 NE WS FOR THE LEGAL PROFESSION DECEMBER 6, 2002
fRen Ta / DReaMs TiMe. CoM
made,” Pinsky said. “If everyone
is acknowledging there is a prob-
lem, why would one delay?”
The issue is a live one in prov-
inces such as Manitoba and
Ontario, which split matrimonial
property by equalizing its value
between the spouses, rather than
by dividing the assets themselves.
Brendan Crawley, a spokes-
person for the Ontario Ministry of
the Attorney General, said:
“Ontario is supportive of amend-
ments to the federal BIA so that
the financial interests of a spouse
are better protected following the
bankruptcy of their former spouse.”
Last July, the Supreme Court
noted that “none of the policies
underlying the BIA require that
[Schreyer] emerge from the mar-
riage with no substantial assets.”
The court pointedly observed
that “Parliament could amend
the BIA in respect of the effect of
a bankrupt’s discharge on equal-
ization claims and exempt assets.
But the absence of such an
amendment makes the outcome
of this case unavoidable.”
Nicholson noted in the com-
muniqué from the federal-prov-
incial-territorial ministers (FPT)
of justice and public safety that
he was also taking “under advise-
ment” a request for reform of s.
25.1 of the Divorce Act.
“We acknowledged the value,
and importance, of federal and
provincial funding for drug
treatment courts as an alterna-
tive model for drug-addicted
offenders within the criminal
justice system.”
Nicholson also welcomed the
support of the provinces and ter-
ritories for several federal bills
that would authorize sweeping
new surveillance and other inves-
tigative measures.
These bills would help “police
to crack down on criminals who
work online to steal rent money
through websites, incite others to
commit suicide through social
media, and post child pornography,” Nicholson said.
The communiqué reported no
progress on the demand from the
provinces and territories for
increased legal aid funding. Nor
was there apparent movement in
the dispute between the federal
government and provinces such as
Ontario and Quebec demanding
that Ottawa help them pay for the
hundreds of millions of dollars in
increased incarceration costs that
are anticipated from the mandatory
minimum sentences in the proposed omnibus crime bill C- 10. n
® THE LAWYERS WEEKLY
VOL. 22, NO. 27 NEWS FOR THE LEGAL PROFESSION DECEMBER 6, 2002
Publisher
Julie Murtha
Editor In Chief
Rob kelly
Focus Editor
Matthew Grace, LL.B.
Ottawa Bureau Chief
Cristin schmitz
Art Director
Tammy Leung
Production Coordinator
Pauline Braithwaite
Interns
karen alexiou & anum Lateef
Correspondents
Luigi Benetton, Toronto
arnold Ceballos, LL.B., Toronto
Thomas Claridge, Toronto
Christopher Guly, ottawa
Jeremy hainsworth, Vancouver
Geoff kirbyson, winnipeg
Luis Millan, Montreal
donalee Moulton, halifax
Mike sadava, edmonton
THE LAWYERS WEEKLY
Vol. 22, No. 27 NEWS FOR THE LEGAL PROFESSION December 6, 2002
THE LAWYERS WEEKLY
VOL. 22, NO. 27 NEWS FOR THE LEGAL PROFESSION DECEMBER 6, 2002
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