Canadian Lawyer

letters to the editor Comments from canadianlawyermag.com RegionaL wRap-up Re: Betrayed, beguiled, and abandoned? atlantIC February 2013 what is the purpose of a legal education? I read with interest the comment that Dean [Ian] holloway doesn���t want law schools to become ���trade��� schools. when over 90 per cent of the students want to become lawyers, what���s wrong with focusing on teaching students the ���trade?��� Medicine already mandates residency programs and engineering has now embraced the benefits of co-op programs. Law students often have difficulty finding articling positions because they do not offer good value for money. Unless they have had the opportunity to participate in some of the intensive practice programs, they have little understanding of ���how to��� be a lawyer. Law schools are a profit centre for many universities. They charge high fees. This generation���s students should really question how much value they are getting for their fees. The reality is that most lawyers learn how to be good lawyers from a good mentor/articling principal. perhaps the profession should start charging students for the training we are expected to give? ��� online comment from NEENA GUPTA I agree there is nothing wrong with thinking of law school as a kind of trade school, or rather a professional program not too dissimilar to medicine, dentistry, etc. Those programs have as their primary goal the creation of a certain kind of professional practitioner. when I was making the (agonizing) decision to switch careers and attend law school, I read several of the ���so you want to go to law school��� publications. They cautioned, among other things, against the view that a law degree is great even if you do not wish to practise law. Law school in Canada and the U.s. is predominantly for those who wish to go on to be lawyers. while it is true that lawyers often transition to other interests in business and government, I suspect that is because they were successful and/or connected lawyers. ��� online comment from CHAD CONRAD I enjoyed reading this article about the challenges facing new graduates and the legal profession today. I agree with Neena that today���s reality is that most lawyers learn how to be good lawyers (as opposed to legal thinkers) from a good mentor but I think it misses the point to believe that the fix for our profession is to start charging for the training that ���we are expected to give.��� while hiring an articling student has to be an economic decision, we were paid to receive this training and it���s somewhat inconsistent with the goal of fixing licensing to now propose to take advantage of what we were given and charge the new entrants to our profession. hiring a student, if you can, should be seen as giving back to the profession what you were given. ��� online comment from CATHERINE VIRGO Thanks for a considered and balanced article on the challenges we face. I echo dean holloway���s sentiment that the future of legal education in this country and what ails it presently are our collective responsibility. As professor [Adam] Dodek and Jordan furlong point out, the new Lpp pathway to licensing in ontario is the most significant change in the last 70 years, and, if implemented carefully, holds out great promise for a better system of transitional training for the next generation of lawyers. ��� online comment from LSUC Treasurer THOMAS CONWAY Great article. provocative and balanced. ��� online comment from BRUCE FELDTHUSEN KNOwLEDGE HOUSE SAGA ENTERS NEw CHAPTER C hapter two of the Knowledge House Inc. saga ��� which has unfolded in the courts for more than a decade ��� has introduced a new player: the Nova Scotia Barristers��� Society. An investor in the former e-learning company, which at its pinnacle in 2000 had a market capitalization of $111 million, has laid a formal complaint with the NSBS against two lawyers employed with the Nova Scotia Securities Commission. A procedural decision released last year by the securities commission, in its ongoing stock manipulation case against Knowledge House, brought to light a confidential agreement the commission had inked in 2005 with National Bank Financial Ltd., which was heavily involved in the debacle. The secrecy was unwarranted, commissioner David Gruchy concluded. ���I can see no public interest in maintaining the escrow agreement,��� he said in his decision. ���It has thwarted the established process for dealing with settlement agreements and has had the effect of keeping the settlement agreement confidential for a completely unreasonable length of time.��� The deal amounts to ���obstruction of justice��� as far as Lowell Weir, who lost nearly $800,000 when Knowledge House stock plummeted, is concerned. ���Three years they fought to keep us from finding out that ��� in the courts, in the appeal courts ��� and they knew that information was relevant to our case,��� he told The Chronicle Herald. Weir has formally filed complaints with NSBS. The realtor is not the only one angry about being kept in the dark. Former Knowledge House CEO Dan Potter has publicly stated he will be asking the court to lift a publication ban on the deal reached between the Nova Scotia Securities Commission and National Bank. Potter, a self-represented litigant throughout the course of the complex and varied litigation, still has additional legal battles to fight. Two years ago the RCMP brought criminal charges against the one-time head of the company, the firm���s former lawyer, and a former stockbroker. Recently Potter said he should be cleared of any charges much like the former CEO and CFO of Nortel Networks, who were found not guilty on charges of fraud earlier this year. In the meantime, Weir���s complaint against the commission���s director of enforcement and the unit���s legal counsel will proceed, likely at a snail���s pace. Complaints usually require months to resolve and the continuing court battle over Knowledge House, whose stock value reached an alltime low of 15 cents just before the company���s collapse in 2001, will only add to the timeline. Securities commission spokeswoman Tanya Wiltshire told reporters the investigation was in the ���infancy stages.��� One investigation has concluded, however. Late last year Weir, who is also a chartered accountant, was fined for insider trading involving a software company he once controlled. ��� DoNALee MoULToN donalee@quantumcommunications.ca www.CANADIAN L a w ye r m a g . c o m March 2013 7

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