A significant number of people have visited this site recently looking for the new Ontario Superior Court of Justice decision in Bedford v. Canada by Justice Susan G. Himel, relating to the Criminal Code provisions on prostitution.

Sections 210, 212(l)(j), and 213(1)(c) of the Criminal Code were struck down as violating section 7 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and
Freedoms.

At para. 170 of the decision Justice Himel cites the 2006 study by the House of Commons Report of the Subcommittee on Solicitation Laws, The Challenge of Change: A Study of Canada’s Criminal Prostitution Laws, which states,

The vulnerability of persons engaging in street prostitution is also related to the fact that they frequently change locations. As a result of an arrest, fear of arrest, or a court order, [street prostitutes] are often forced to move to another area, effectively separating them from friends, co-workers, regular customers and familiar places. A number of witnesses indicated that this instability jeopardizes prostitutes’ health, safety and well-being.

The case has been uploaded here to assist these members of the public in accessing this information.

Bedford v. Canada, 2010 ONSC 4264

A special thanks to Simon Fodden on Slaw and the University of Toronto’s Sexual Diversity Blog for facilitating this process. See LexisNexis for a case summary, and CanLii for the complete text in html.

The 2010 Ontario Bar Association (OBA) Award for Excellence in Civil Litigation went to Bonnie A. Tough of
Tough & Podrebarac LLP.

Award and ceremony was held at The Fairmont Royal York Hotel in Toronto. Keynote speech was presented by Harvey Strosberg Q.C. of Sutts, Strosberg LLP.

(From Left) Robert M. Macdonald of Navigant Consulting; Colin P. Stevenson; Bonnie A. Tough; The Honourable R. Roy McMurtry, OC, O.Ont, QC; David Sterns of Sotos LLP

(From Left) Omar Ha-Redeye; Brian Decaire of Simpson Wigle Law LLP; OBA President Lee Akazaki of Gilbertson Davis Emerson; Young Lawyers Division - Toronto Chair Guillermo Schible of Hodder Barristers

Chris Guly profiles Omar Ha-Redeye in this week’s issue of The Lawyers Weekly:

	Articling Student Eyes Litigation
Profile on Omar Ha-Redeye

A web version of the article is available here.

Articling student eyes litigation

The short answer is, “about $6 million, all in.”
For the full story, see The Lawyers Weekly:

	What’s a Lawyer Worth These Days?
by Omar Ha-Redeye

For further commentary on the issue, see Law is Cool.

The Lawyers Weekly – Opinion 9-24-10

The Federation of Asian Canadian Lawyers (FACL), South Asian Bar Association – Toronto (SABA), and Canadian Association of Black Lawyers (CABL) hosted an event at Blaney McMurtry LLP on diversity and public appointments.

Debra Roberts, Deputy Chief of Staff from the Public Appointments Secretariat, spoke about the application system and how the process to get appointed to provincial boards or tribunals works.

The Public Appointments Secretariat (PAS)  administers and processes the appointment of qualified individuals to over 600 provincial agencies boards and commissions in Ontario. They support the Premier in administering the public appointments process, and serve as the focal point for queries from agencies, ministries and the public regarding the appointments process.

The Public Appointments Secretariat is also the body responsible for appointing Justices of the Peace in Ontario, and several health-related tribunals.

Bruce Carton of Legal Blog Watch picked up on a post on Slaw about Paris Hilton’s purse on TwitPic.

James Yap, graduate of Osgoode Hall, and Omar Ha-Redeye, collaborated on a piece regarding Piedra v. Copper Mesa Mining Corporation, 2010 ONSC 2421, posted on both The Court and Law is Cool.

The Court is Osgoode Hall’s legal blog, focusing largely on decisions by the Supreme Court of Canada. James Yap was a Senior Editor at The Court while he was there for school.

Antonin Pribetic also has some interesting comments on this piece over at The Trial Warrior.

The spirit of collegiality and collaboration has extended to the 2010 Student Blawger of the Year Award, offered to another Senior Editor at The Court, Ahsan Mirza.

In his first column with The Lawyers Weekly, Omar Ha-Redeye discusses the challenges of hiring older articling students, especially in bigger law firms.

	Omar Ha-Redeye’s column in The Lawyers Weekly
ARTICLING STUDENTS worry about ageism at law firms

The Lawyers Weekly – Career 9-10-10

Starting September 1, 2010, new amendments to the automobile insurance system were enacted affecting the medical and care benefits that litigants can receive in motor vehicle accidents.

The Law Society of Upper Canada and the Ontario Bar Association hosted a session, The New Auto Insurance Regime – Practical Strategies for Radical Change.

Speakers included John A. McLeish and Dale V. Orlando of McLeish Orlando LLP, and Roger G. Oatley and James L. Vigmond of Oatley, Vigmond LLP.

The topics discussed included the definition of minor and catastrophic injuries,and rehabilitation, housekeeping, caregiver and attendant care benefits.

The new Statutory Accident Benefits Schedule (SABS)  can be found in Ontario Regulation 34/10 to the Insurance Act.  A table of time periods is available through Taran Virtual Associates.

For more on this talk see the notes on Slaw. The Tournay v. Dominion of Canada General Insurance Company FSCO decision referred to in that post can be found here.