Legal Feeds Blog

Thursday, 03 May 2012 15:13

Budget cuts hit CBC legal as counsel Daniel Henry exits

It seems the legal department at CBC is sharing in the pain of budget cuts as senior legal counsel Daniel Henry’s position with the national broadcaster has been eliminated.

Daniel Henry in a 2005 file photo.

After more than 34 years with CBC/Radio-Canada it was announced this week that Henry is retiring to pursue other opportunities.

An internal statement released by the CBC states: “One of the difficult decisions we had to make under the Deficit Reduction Action Plan was to eliminate Daniel Henry’s position. He will remain with us until the end of June to ensure an orderly transfer of his files.”

In his years at CBC, Henry assisted the broadcaster at all levels across Canada, from the studio to the president, in all services, including news, sports, and entertainment, and in all support services, from engineering to business affairs and sales. He has worked closely with most of CBC’s national and regional programs, on radio, television and in digital media.

He is known for his advocacy for cameras in court, and was involved in many cases of significance in media law, including Dagenais v. Canadian Broadcasting Corp., the decision that overturned the ban on broadcasting CBC’s film The Boys of St. Vincent. The judgment is considered one of the most important rulings by the Supreme Court of Canada on free expression under the Charter.

“All these years, Daniel has personified freedom of the media and the public’s right to know. He has been a staunch supporter and advocate for public broadcasting in promoting those rights. His commitment and devotion have made Daniel a lawyer respected throughout CBC/Radio-Canada and the legal community across the country,” said Maryse Bertrand, vice president, real estate, legal services and general counsel, in the internal statement.

CBC/Radio-Canada’s legal services in Toronto will now consist of 35-year veteran Michael Hughes, supported by Sean Moreman and Anne Ko, and with the rest of the media law team in Ottawa and Montreal.

Calls to Henry by Canadian Lawyer InHouse were not returned.

UdeM converts degree to JD

The Université de Montréal is joining the JD world by changing the name of its common law degree.

Since the common law program’s inception in 2001, it has been called the diplôme d'etudes supérieures spécialisées, which UdeM law dean Gilles Trudeau says has no resonance outside of Quebec.

To go ahead with the name change, UdeM needed certification from the Federation of Law Societies of Canada and approval from all of the law societies. The Law Society of Upper Canada passed a motion at Convocation on April 26 in agreement with the FLSC’s recommendations.

Trudeau says it’s an important modification. “[JD] is much more recognized on the market than holding a DESS,” he says. “So when in your CV you put JD from the Université de Montréal, it means more to the eventual employer than the former DESS that meant nothing outside of Quebec.”

Students may choose to take the one-year JD program after they complete their three-year LLB.

Up until this point, graduates of the DESS program were required to apply to the FLSC’s National Committee on Accreditation to receive recognition of their degrees before applying to provincial bars outside of Quebec. This process will not be necessary for graduates of the JD program as their degrees will automatically be recognized; making it easier to practise throughout Canada.

Trudeau says approximately one-third of UdeM’s law students opt for the common law degree. “More and more students see the need of being able to practise nationally because major law firms in Canada used to be more local and they have merged into very large corporations,” he says, giving the example of Norton Rose Canada LLP.

“With the globalization of the practice of law, [having a JD is] a major benefit in Canada and in international organizations as well,” he adds.

“Our students see that if they want to be able to have a practice which is internationally or nationally based, they need to be trained in common law and to be able to represent their clients everywhere in Canada,” Trudeau says.

Not all Quebec law schools offer a common law degree since civil law is practised in that province. Although the Université de Sherbrooke offers a similar one-year JD common law degree, it has not yet been certified by the FLSC.