Legal Feeds Blog

Monday, 14 May 2012 10:55

New LSUC treasurer to focus on articling

Thomas Conway has been elected treasurer of the Law Society of Upper Canada. Conway will begin his term following Convocation proceedings on June 28 and will serve as the law society’s top elected official.

Thomas Conway was acclaimed as the new LSUC treasurer last week.

He will replace current law society treasurer Laurie Pawlitza, who has held the position since June 2010.

“I’m very humbled and honoured to be elected and I hope to continue the really great work of the treasurers before me,” Conway tells Legal Feeds. “I have big shoes to fill and I hope I am able to help ensure the law society meets its core responsibilities.”

While Conway says he doesn’t plan to make any drastic changes to the law society in his new role, he says he does hope to listen to the needs of Convocation and focus on key areas like articling and tribunal reform.

“I think this Convocation has been particularly vocal about wanting to focus on improving the law society’s commitment to its core responsibilities, particularly in light of these challenging economic times,” says Conway. “They want to ensure law society dues are spent judiciously and wisely and I intend to carry that forward.”

Conway is a partner at Cavanagh Williams Conway Baxter LLP in Ottawa where he practises civil and commercial litigation.

In the past, he has served as president of the Carleton County Law Association and an adjunct Faculty of Law professor at the University of Ottawa.

Conway was first elected as bencher of the law society in 2007 and has served as chairman of the professional development and competence committee and co-chairman of the retention of women in private practice working group. he is also chair of the law society’s articling task force.

Conway says he hopes to carry on the work of those initiatives in his new role.

“I certainly intend to continue the very important work of those programs and I will see them through to the end,” says Conway. “Certainly if the Articling Task Force makes recommendations and Convocation accepts them, I’ll be intent on ensuring articling reforms are implemented in a timely way.”

Conway was elected by acclamation and will be the law society’s 64th Treasurer.

Read more on this story in next week’s Law Times.

This week at the SCC

The Supreme Court of Canada will hear the following appeals this week including the highly anticipated R. v. Cole, about a high school teacher who was charged after nude photos of a Grade 10 student were found on a laptop issued to him by his regional school board. The photos were ruled inadmissible by the Ontario Court of Appeal a year ago on the principle that Cole had a right to expect his personal files on the computer’s hard drive would remain private.

May 14 — Federal Court — Callaghan v. Chief Electoral Officer of Canada

Administrative law: This case relates to expenses during the 2006 federal elections. The chief electoral officer wouldn’t reimburse certain expenses submitted by some Conservative party candidates because he was concerned that the party might have incurred the advertising costs but then transferred them to the candidates since it had almost reached its spending limit. The candidates successfully challenged the officer’s decision before the Federal Court but the Federal Court of Appeal allowed the appeal.

May 15 — Ontario — R. v. Cole

Charter of Rights and Freedoms: Richard Cole was a computer science high school teacher. One of the school’s information technologists found naked photos of a female student on Cole’s computer, which he had accessed through another student’s email account. He was charged with possession of child pornography and fraudulently obtaining data from another computer hard drive. At trial, the judge determined that Cole’s s. 8 Charter rights had been violated and excluded the evidence. The Court of Appeal then allowed the appeal and remitted the case for trial. There is a publication ban in the case.

May 16 — Nova Scotia — Aucoin v. R.

Charter of Rights and Freedoms: Brendan Aucoin was convicted of possessing cocaine for the purposes of trafficking. On appeal, he argued that his s. 8 Charter rights had been violated when the police officer conducted a pat-down search, which the majority of the Court of Appeal dismissed.