Betsy Powell of the Toronto Star continues to report on this breaking story.
Here is my blog entry on her earlier reporting and the LSO’s News Releases on the issue:
Toronto Star Reporter Betsy Powell today reports on the departure of Law Society of Ontario CEO Diana Miles and a highly secret meeting of Benchers held last night. My own view is we, as licensees, are entitled to receive the Report commissioned to investigate this matter if it is paid for with our fees, which I am guessing is the case as I highly doubt it was a service provided pro bono.
I encourage everyone to do what I did – ask for the Report and put all your other questions, to the Media Liaison person named on the announcement:
Media contact: Lisa Hall, Director Communications, lhall@lso.ca.
Some questions might be:
“Was there a severance package to Diana Miles?”
“What’s the new CEO getting paid?” and
“Why is the Report not publicly available on the Law Society’s website?” or
“Why has it not been shared with 77 thousand licensees already?”
“When will it be shared?” and
“Do we REALLY have to pay $5 for an FOI here?”
Here is today’s Star piece and kudos to Betsy Powell for reporting on this fiasco:
On March 6, 2025 the Law Society News release page now refers to the O’Connor report as “confidential legal advice.” Of note, that was not what it was announced as on Feb 17 when it was an “independent and impartial review” and “updates” in the wake of its delivery were promised by our Treasurer.
Today the LSO says this instead:
Update on Changes to the Law Society’s Leadership and Independent Review
March 06, 2025
The Law Society of Ontario’s Convocation met Wednesday night to consider a privileged confidential report from the Hon. Dennis O’Connor. Following that meeting, we made some changes to our leadership, and we’ll be making more changes to our governance.
As we noted in a release last night, Priya Bhatia has been appointed as our acting CEO.
The Law Society is going to make improvements to its governance to support effective regulation of the legal professions, in the public interest. We’re going to enhance how Treasurers and benchers are trained and oriented when they take up their positions. We’re going to clarify the roles and responsibilities of committees. We’re going to improve how our records, minutes and other governing documents are stored and accessed.
As Mr. O’Connor’s opinion is privileged legal advice, Convocation has decided it should be kept confidential. Similarly, given what was being discussed, yesterday’s meeting was held in camera and is also confidential.
anitaszigeti 