/BarTalk/Articles/2018/October/Columns/You-Only-Live-Twice
There's an old adage that you don’t die once, but twice: the first time when you stop breathing, and many years later when someone mentions your name for the very last time. That’s why, as we near Remembrance Day in 2018, I’d like to talk about the First World War, which ende...
/BarTalk/Articles/2018/October/Features/Rights-Recognition
... The government will develop – in full partnership with Indigenous peoples – a new Recognition and Implementation of Indigenous Rights Framework (“RRIF”) that will include… recognition and implementation of rights legislation. The federal government’s absence over ...
/BarTalk/Articles/2018/October/Columns/These-words-will-always-ring-true
Often these words and thoughts are not considered when contemplating the plight of Indigenous peoples in Canada. Senator Murray Sinclair, Chair of Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada (the “TRC”) has remarked that Canadians should know that Indigenous peoples have do...
/BarTalk/Articles/2018/October/Columns/Power-and-Influence
At 4:20 a.m., I left my home in a taxi headed to the Vancouver airport to catch a 6:00 a.m. flight to Kamloops. The purpose of my journey and my first official act as CBABC President was to address the first-year law students of Thompson Rivers University. I had been presiden...
/BarTalk/Articles/2018/October/Columns/The-Advantage-of-Being-Young
From a simple reality stems many complicated realities: there were people living on the land we now call Canada, long before there was a Colony of France (first) and Colony of Great Britain (predominant later). The history of how colonial powers treated the original inhabita...
/BarTalk/Articles/2018/August/Columns/The-Speculation-Tax-That-Isn’t
I have a running battle with a realtor friend who is adamantly against the Foreign Buyers Tax introduced by the previous Liberal government to deal with offshore speculation of residential real estate. At the time, the tax added 15% to all real estate purchases in Vancouver...
/BarTalk/Articles/2018/June/Columns/She-Blinded-Me-with-Science
B ack in November, some Canadians got their trousers in a tizzy when our new Governor General, Julie Payette, expressed an opinion about “science.” Ms. Payette has an electrical engineering degree from McGill and a Master of Applied Science degree in Computer Engineering fr...
/BarTalk/Articles/2018/April/Columns/All-Thy-Sons-(and-Daughters)-Command
I have this terrible problem with change. My wife and I have owned a timeshare at Club Intrawest since 2007. I like owning there because it forces us to go on holidays and we don’t have to worry about the trials and tribulations of recreational real estate ownership. We’ve ...
/BarTalk/Articles/2018/February/Columns/Dragonslayer
I only remember two things about the woman who ran HR at Douglas Symes and Brissenden in 1985 when I began my articles, and neither of them involved her name. First, she wore a black suit on Fridays, but only if she was going to fire someone that day. And second, in the day...
/BarTalk/Articles/2017/December/Columns/Tales-from-a-Topographic-Yacht-Rocker
I n the same week the Beatle Industry released yet another remix of Sgt. Pepper’s in time for its 50th Anniversary, I went to see the Battle of the Bar Bands at the Commodore, which is a fabulous event for Vancouver lawyers that I have yet to be invited to play drums at. Per...