Welcome to LegalEase, a broadcast about law cast broadly. We are your hosts Alice Mirlesse, Zach Morgenstern, and Emma Noradounkian for this November edition of LegalEase.
Bienvenu(e)s à LegalEase, une émission consacrée au droit qui vise à en rendre le jargon plus accessible tout en évaluant de manière critique ses institutions.
First off, we are joined by a Divest McGill activist, who was arrested at Parliament Hill on October 24th. They were calling for Prime Minister Justin Trudeau to halt the construction of the Kinder Morgan Pipeline.
Next, the Quebec State Lawyers have been on strike for approximately two weeks as of today, with an unlimited mandate, waiting for their collective agreement to be renewed. A recent TAT decision has deemed certain services “essential,” to which lawyers reacted by saying that they should benefit from special negotiation procedure in light of that new categorization. In this show, we explore a different but related issue of the unionization of Lawyers, in the context of Ontario Legal Aid. We will speak with Garrett, a criminal defence lawyer who is currently organizing the first ever Legal Aid Lawyers union.
Finally, still on the subject of strikes, fair wages and collective bargaining we interviewed two representatives from AMUSE – the McGill temporary workers union– which has recently declared a five day strike and are bargaining, amongst other things, for a $15 minimum wage.