For a host of intersecting reasons that all came to a head over the last few days, I devoted a bit of time over this past Mother’s Day weekend to reflecting on the questionable utility of my contribution to any conversation about the Law Society of Ontario and its recent activities.
On balance, I concluded that what I believed to be a public service was actually not having the desired effect. Quite the opposite in fact. It has caused me exposure to threats and criticism and become stressful without the side-benefit I had hoped it would have in drawing others out of the woodwork to join in putting pressure on the Society to start correcting course. Instead, they appear to have dug themselves deeper into all the things I think are most problematic and I see little point in being the only person out of 71 thousand legal professionals to publicly decry the conduct. There is nothing in this for me personally and if the profession is prepared to tolerate what’s happening and \ or the silence that big lawyer organizations continue to choose on this issue, so be it. We will get exactly what we deserve in that event.
The final straw for me I think was the announcement of who the candidates are for Treasurer for the next term. I gather how it works is the Treasurer is only elected for one year at a time but habitually the second year of that term has been effectively presumed.
As I understand it, Treasurers, whether incumbents renewed for a second term, or a new Treasurer, incoming, are most often simply affirmed or acclaimed into the role. Occasionally an election is held. Last year, in 2024, current Treasurer Peter Wardle was elected after a contested vote – the other candidate was Sid Troister, who was on the Compensation Committee and now chairs Audit and Finance and other important Committees. At that time, the choice was between two older white men from Bay street firms.
Treasurer Wardle’s current first term is up this June. Specifically on June 25.
I guess to an extent historical “convention” is being disrupted, in that there is a contested election happening at all — ie Peter Wardle is not going to be acclaimed to continue as Treasurer for a second term.
This year, Benchers will elect their new Treasurer on June 18.
On Friday the LSO released the names of the three Benchers nominated for the Treasurer spot this time by the other Benchers.
https://lso.ca/news-events/latest-news/latest-news-2025/candidates-for-the-office-of-treasurer
The options now are three older white men, one former or current FULL STOP prominent figure, Murray Klippenstein, Treasurer Wardle and a third person, named Stephen Rotstein whom I don’t know, but who either now sits or previously has sat on the Federal Judicial Advisory Committee. He has or has had a role in who is appointed a judge of our Superior Court, Court of Appeal or Supreme Court of Canada.
https://lawsocietytribunal.ca/adjudicator/adj-stephen-rotstein/
This tells me a few things – first, the nomination and continued interest by Treasurer Wardle to stay in the role, is very surprising to me given that independent reports have flagged his role in the Compensation scandal and it has elsewhere been suggested perhaps he should be taking a step back from all this. His handling of the scandal has been sharply criticized. And yet he is nominated by two Benchers, including Atrisha Lewis, a prominent Black lawyer who has just left McCarthy’s in the wake of their dissolution of their DEI program for Black and Indigenous lawyers. Maybe, given her unwavering confidence in him, I have missed something and this is the right man to lead us forward as a profession after all.
However, all that I can see at the minute is this was Convocation’s chance to register its dismay with all that has happened, and gather together to make meaningful change or support a chance for “transformational” leadership in at least nominating one of the remaining 51 Benchers for Treasurer. There are indeed lots of accomplished, hard-working, decent Benchers in whom I anyway would have confidence to lead during the most turbulent times the Society is facing, in the entire history of its existence.
I see this as a missed opportunity, frankly, to bolster the representation that is valued by many members of the profession in any and all respects that matter to the 60 thousand lawyers and 11 thousand paralegals whom the Society governs. Many licensees are women, racialized lawyers, members of the 2SLGBTQ+ communities and so many are in small firm or solo practices, representing vulnerable client populations on legal aid retainers. A new Treasurer representing any, if not all, those affected members, might well have been a breath of fresh air, after this last term and the dominance of big law practitioners in the scandal that brought us to this point. Add to that, this was again, a missed opportunity, to elect a leader with a mandate to address the issues that continue to plague the Society, in the wake of the CEOSS scandal – by starting afresh with someone at the helm who can unite, rather than divide, both Convocation, and the membership they govern.
Instead, this election is sure to continue, or revive, depending on how you see it, the former Good Governance Coalition vs STOP SOP infighting that I believe resulted in a lot of what’s wrong, starting with the last election’s toxic atmosphere and resulting in the Compensation Committee scandal. I honestly can’t watch this up close without becoming overwhelmingly distressed and disappointed.
Maybe someone else will step into the breach and pay some attention to who is governing us or how.
For the summer I will be off this self-imposed duty.
I currently plan to return in the fall, in time for the AGM, but you never know!
In the meanwhile, perhaps a new Treasurer will be elected, who will immediately institute a fresh culture of transparency and accountability and right a sinking ship.
Or for all I know, the sky will fall in the interim, and I’ll be pressed back into the action.
Or something so atrocious will occur, that I’ll join those who have written to Ontario’s Attorney General requesting that he take over governing the legal profession because self-governance has become a mockery.
But apart from something earth-shattering, I think I prefer to spend the summer caring for my own mental and physical health while Convocation sorts itself and identifies its next leader.
We don’t know who that will be apart from the certainty of who it won’t be.
I’ll leave it to you all to fill in those blanks.
Enjoy the summer everyone!
Post-Script Edited May 28 2025 – Still managing to stay out of it, but here are interviews by JP Rodrigues of Justice in Pieces with the two challengers to Treasurer Wardle in the June Treasurer election by Benchers.
Murray Klippenstein
Stephen Rotstein
anitaszigeti 