CBABC Women Lawyers Forum Update
The CBABC Women Lawyers Forum started 2009 off with a bang with our “Be a Rising Star” event where a panel of distinguished speakers spoke about what it takes to rise in the legal profession and what it’s like once you get there.

We hosted our orientation lunch for our new mentoring pairs in February; held our Spring Potluck in March and presented our annual Education Day on May 29th – a full day of sessions targeted at how to survive the current economic times.

On June 23, 2009 join us for our Kick Off To Summer and AGM at the Law Courts Inn from 5:30 – 7:30 p.m. Join us on the patio for a fun evening that includes electing our Executive and hearing from B.C. Ombudsman Kim Carter who was Canada’s first female Chief Military Judge.


Annual Practice Declarations
The Law Society of B.C. requires each member to complete an annual Practice Declaration because:

• By filling out the forms, the Society can ensure lawyers are properly reporting information as required by Society Rules.
• The Society gathers statistical information relating to a lawyer’s practice in order to track trends. From these statistics, the Law Society is better able to develop targeted programs.

There are two different Declarations, depending on your practice. A lawyer who works for a government department, a corporation other than a law firm, a society or trade union is required to fill out the Declaration for Insurance-Exempt Lawyers. Those in private practice are required to fill out the Schedule 2 Individual Lawyer’s Practice Declaration (which is now attached to the Trust Report).

Lawyers who fail to complete the declaration will not be issued a practicing certificate. Filing deadlines vary, and the Society will send out notifications to individual lawyers as the deadline approaches. The Declarations take only a few minutes to complete, and can be accessed online at www.lsbc.org under Member Services.

These articles were published in the June 2009 issue of BarTalk. © 2009 The Canadian Bar Association. All rights reserved.