Law Times

Law Times • September 30, 2013 Page 3 NEWS Survey to examine experience of sexual minorities in legal profession BY JENNIFER BROWN Law Times A team of researchers led by two Queen's University professors is trying to learn more about the work experiences of law school grads who identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, twospirit, and other sexual minorities. If you have a law degree or equivalent from a Canadian or foreign university, and self-identify as a member of a sexual minority, Audrey Kobayashi and Kathleen Lahey hope you will complete the survey. The Queen's professors launched the confidential online survey, the first of its kind in Canada, on Sept. 23 in French and English. The survey is being done in collaboration with researchers from College of New Caledonia, Queen's University, University of Calgary, and University of Windsor. The researchers want to learn more about people who identify as sexual minorities and their experiences after they graduated from law school. The confidential survey focuses on the realities of continuing issues of "invisibility, disclosure, bias, and acceptance." "The concept of employment equity requires that employers remove all barriers to full participation in the workplace for everyone who has historically been marginalized or oppressed," says Kobayashi. "This project will allow us to gain a deeper understanding of the experiences of LGBTQ people entering or leaving the legal profession, and to understand the circumstances where barriers continue either to deny full participation, or to keep people from living their gender identities openly." The researchers ask participants about the legal sex assigned to them at birth and their current one. The survey also asks if they're "completely out" to everyone regarding their sexual orientation and gender identity. If respondents aren't out of the closet, the survey asks the reasons for the discretion. Researchers also ask if respondents feel they've missed out on professional opportunities or treated as less competent due to their sexual orientation or gender identity. They hope to find out, for example, whether there are differences according to different gender identities and whether different types of legal professionals or law firms are more open or have gone further in removing barriers to full participation. "Everyone deserves not only fairness, equity, and justice, but also to be able to live comfortably in a work environment that is conducive to full participation and welcoming of all employees," says Kobayashi. Lahey says while Canadian law societies, professional associations, and law schools have a strong record of addressing these issues, even major professional surveys have failed to obtain enough responses to thoroughly examine how people have fared in relation to the legal profession. "It's not for want of trying," says Lahey, who worked on the first survey of gender, race, sexual orientation, and immigration status in the early 1980s. "We were able to get a lot of responses in but the problem is the rate of response on the part of people characterized by their sexual orientation and gender identities is really hard to get — we got a one-per-cent disclosure rate in 1981. When the Law Society of Upper Canada did a similar study in 2004, they only came up with a one-per-cent disclosure rate." "We're looking to get as clear a sense as can be obtained on how people negotiate the public/private divide in the profession," says Lahey. "We have worked hard to try and give people a chance to identify themselves as accurately as possible using a method of self-identification and we are attempting to measure the degree of outness in everything from personal life with family and social acquaintances through to different categories of people one encounters in the work context." Similar studies in the United States and the United Kingdom in the 1990s and 2000s were able to document the persistence of widespread bias against queer lawyers and evaluate workplace and organizational policies. The survey, which takes about 30 minutes to complete, is open until Oct. 21. LT Legal organizations discussing electronic signatures for land transfers BY YAMRI TADDESE Law Times F ollowing a provision in the last provincial budget that made it permissible to sign land transfer documents electronically, several legal organizations are considering the potential impact on the law profession. The Law Society of Upper Canada, LawPRO, the Ontario Bar Association, and the Ministry of the Attorney General are discussing what the change could mean to real estate law, an area that already sees one of the highest volumes of fraud complaints. The government included the provision in its last budget bill, says Ray Leclair, LawPRO's vice president of public affairs. Prior to the provision, the Statute of Frauds allowed only paper documents to be enforced in land matters. "The Statute of Frauds says if you're dealing with land, it had to be on paper and you need a wet signature," says Leclair. "That's the way we've been operating in Ontario forever." Even the Electronic Commerce Act, which says people can do electronically anything they can do on paper, made an exception for land. The government has now removed that exception, but it hasn't come into effect pending proclamation. Ahead of the proclamation, the government is undertaking consultations with various parties to consider the impact of the change on, among other things, real estate fraud. Earlier this year, the law society said in a report that it devotes "significant resources to complaints and claims arising from real estate transactions, including lawyers engaging in mortgage fraud." In principle, none of the parties disagree with the change, says Leclair, who notes the talks are mainly about things that need to happen before the law comes into effect. LT The lawyers and staff of Townsend and Associates will join WeirFoulds effective September 30, 2013. WeirFoulds LLP and Townsend and Associates have joined forces to establish a dynamic new municipal and planning law team. Photo L to R: Jennifer Meader, Lyn Townsend and Denise Baker Protect your future. Gain a strategic advantage. WeirFoulds LLP. Untitled-3 1 www.lawtimesnews.com 416.365.1110 www.weirfoulds.com 13-09-26 8:15 AM

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