2021

Over the last few years, the legal industry has seen progress in terms of flexible work arrangements offered to individuals. Lawyers have expressed a desire for non-traditional work arrangements which allow those with children or other commitments to balance their careers with the rest of their lives.

The Kamloops Women Lawyers Forum held their Welcome Potluck for the incoming first year law students from Thompson Rivers University in October 2016. This well-attended event was held at the beautiful home of local bencher Michelle Stanford. The aim of this annual event is to introduce the new law students to the Kamloops legal community and to bring them together with potential mentors.

We are all familiar with the continuing high attrition rate for women lawyers, as well as the desire for many lawyers, both women and men, to have acceptable work/life balance. One way to address these issues may be flexible work arrangements.

Kathryn Sainty reports on the recent celebration of 100 years of women’s right to vote in British Columbia – where many of the honoured guests, including Chief Justice Beverley McLachlin, were present because of the tremendous efforts of the women who came before.

In the wake of the recent U.S. election, Caitlin Urquhart writes that it’s no longer enough to call yourself a feminist, especially if you’re doing so from a place of white privilege. It’s time to fight back – for everyone’s benefit.

The WLF (with the support of the CBA Equality Committee) has been advocating for the appointment of more women judges and greater diversity on the bench for a number of years.

The Prince Edward Island Law Foundation was pleased to have Marie Henein provide the 2016 Chief Justice Thane Campbell lecture. She gave the lecture, titled An Inconvenient Profession, on October 12, 2016 at the Confederation Centre of the Arts.

Jennifer Reid and Agnes MacNeil do a Q&A with Nova Scotia’s Deputy Justice Minister, Karen Hudson, Q.C.

In September the national Women Lawyers Forum held a networking event that brought senior practitioners together with young lawyers and law students. How did it go? Law student Debbie Douglas and new call Raweya Abdulwali tell us what they thought.

Sexual harassment and sexual assault within the legal profession are happening far more often than most of us likely want to admit, writes WLF Co-Chair Heidi Schedler. And everyone in the profession has an obligation to make it stop.