by Alex Dimson (from the March Issue of Nexus, Western Law’s Student Newspaper)

A plan to create a new law school at Lakehead University is likely to be approved after significant political pressure was placed on the Law Society of Upper Canada.

Sources tell Nexus that Lakehead’s plan has been fast-tracked and is likely to be approved in the near future, due in part to significant political pressure being placed on the Law Society of Upper Canada (LSUC) to approve the plan. Ontario’s McGuinty government has placed an emphasis on education and skills training in Northern Ontario and local politicians and community organizations have been vocal about the need for a law school in Thunder Bay.

The provincial government plays a significant role in the approval of new law schools, although responsibility is shared between several different bodies. The Ministry of Training, Colleges and Universities must approve any new faculty in Ontario while the LSUC sets the educational standards for students who wish to enter the provincial licensing process. Furthermore, the Federation of Law Societies of Canada is in the process of developing accreditation guidelines that the LSUC intends to rely upon.

It is unclear when a decision on the Lakehead proposal will be made. In early 2007, the LSUC created a new task force to look at the requirements for new law schools in Ontario and the LSUC had told other universities that proposals for new law schools would only be considered after the task force review was complete, expected to be no earlier than the fall 2008. Lakehead’s bid was submitted prior to the task force’s creation and as a result a decision may be made before the task force’s final report.

Lakehead President Fred Gilbert told Nexus that the proposal is likely to be voted on by an LSUC committee in April. Their committee recommendation will be taken up sometime shortly after that by Convocation, the LSUC’s governing body, well in advance of the final task force report. Although there is no guarantee that the 50 Convocation Benchers will vote in favour of the plan, Lakehead President Fred Gilbert told Nexus that he is confident it will be approved.

“All I can say is that we feel that we have addressed all of the issues they indicated were important,” he said. Gilbert also acknowledged that his plan has strong political support “I believe the Law Society understands the breadth and depth of that support and I won’t go into any details but it is consistent with expectations that we would be doing something that is needed and is different.”

The LSUC declined to comment for this article. Kevin Dove, a spokesperson for the Ministry of Training, Colleges and Universities, told Nexus that the Ministry was still intending to wait until the LSUC task force had completed its work.

Lakehead originally submitted their bid in October 2006 and Gilbert said he has been very surprised by how long the approval process has taken. He called the argument that the proposal should only be decided upon after the review of accreditation standards a “red herring.”

“If there are changes to the curricular requirements, all law schools will have to address them,” he said.

Lakehead’s proposal had previously been subject to significant criticism by the LSUC. In early 2007 Convocation, the LSUC’s governing body, voted to defer a decision on the Lakehead proposal and expressed significant concerns about Lakehead’s ability to create a modern law school and its lack of consultation with other law schools. The LSUC also questioned how great the demand was for additional lawyers in Northern Ontario. Lakehead has since revised its proposal.

Western Law Dean Ian Holloway told Nexus that he still had some concerns about the Lakehead plan.

“There are, I think, 150 lawyers in Northern Ontario… Lakehead’s model involves taking in 50 students a year. In three graduating classes they would double the size of the bar in Northern Ontario. Frankly the bar doesn’t need to be doubled,” he said, stating that he believed many of the students would end up competing for jobs with students from other law schools in Southern Ontario.

Gilbert downplayed these concerns. “The University of Western Ontario produces more law school graduates than the local area needs as well,” he noted. “We are understanding of the concerns about overproduction of graduates but our graduates will have a very distinct flavour. They will have a bit of a cachet that other law school graduates will not have, with the emphasis that we will have on natural resources and aboriginal law.”

If many of the 50 Lakehead students end up competing for the same articling positions as those in other law schools, it could make the challenge of finding an articling position even more difficult. The LSUC task force has noted that the 1476 students who sought to become lawyers in Ontario last year exceeded the estimated 1300 articling positions available in a stable economy. By 2009, the number of students seeking to be licensed in Ontario is expected to rise to 1730, not including students from any new law school.

Holloway said that Ontario’s law deans are generally in support of the plan but pointed out that funding issues for the new law school have also not been resolved.

“The law Deans… agreed in principle with the creation of a new law school but we wanted to make sure any new law school is properly resourced. In the context of Lakehead we wanted to make sure that northerners and aboriginal people aren’t shunted off to a second-rate, poorly resourced law school. That is hardly going to advance social justice in the community, he said. “Where will the money for the Lakehead law school come from?”

While Lakehead had initially planned to admit their first class of students in September 2009, Gilbert said that he now expects it to be open no earlier than September 2010. If the Lakehead bid is approved it would be the first time in nearly fourty years that a new law school was created in Ontario. The last law school in Canada to be approved was the University of Calgary in 1979.

Updates

Jordan Furlong adds his commentary at Law21.