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REGIONAL WRAP-UP Lawyer crisis hitting Prairie legal aid services represent the poorest people in the two prairie provinces. The problem is most acute in Manitoba, where the stable of 260 lawyers accepting at least one legal aid case annually has fallen by 100 over the past year. "We're in a bit of a crisis," says Gerry McNeilly, execu- tive director and CEO of Legal Aid Manitoba. He says if the situation doesn't improve, the federally L egal aid services in Manitoba and Saskatchewan are having diffi cul- ty fi nding private bar lawyers to THE PRAIRIES funded organization will have to start turning away potential clients, even if they qualify for legal aid assistance. That, in turn, will lead to more self-representation, increased back- logs in courts, and judges spending more time directing traf- fi c than dealing with cases at hand. "How far do you go in giving directions to an unrepresented litigant in a matter or an accused who is representing themselves? You hope people will have the opportunity to get fair outcomes," he says. McNeilly says his staff typically makes an average of 10 calls before fi nding a private bar lawyer willing to take on a family law case. The situation isn't quite as bad for criminal cases, he says. A big part of the problem is that Legal Aid Manitoba pays private bar lawyers $57 per hour, the lowest tariff across the country. McNeilly says he's going to take matters into his own hands. He says he plans to talk to the law school at the University of Manitoba about altering its focus from commercial and corporate law and to the bigger law fi rms in Winnipeg about encouraging their junior lawyers to do legal aid work. The dependence on the private bar is signifi cantly lower in Saskatchewan, where in-house lawyers handle about 90 per cent of legal aid cases. In Manitoba, it's virtually a 50-50 saw-off. Allan Snell, CEO of Saskatchewan Le- gal Aid, says every legal aid plan across the country is facing a cash crunch to provide services. "We're all really strug- gling. We turn too many people away, that's the bottom line," he says. Snell says his staff has had increasing diffi - culty fi nding lawyers to take fi les in the northern part of the province. The tariff in Saskatchewan has risen from $60 to $80 over the past year, a response to the feedback from lawyers who said the money wasn't adequate compensation for their ef- forts. Snell says that while a 33-per-cent hike sounds impres- sive, it's still well below market rates. "I think it's fair to say private bar lawyers subsidize legal aid quite signifi cantly," he says. "Depending on where you're working, [compensation] could be signifi cantly lower than at the large fi rms in the city, but it's pretty good in comparison to the private bar in rural areas. We try to keep as close as possible to Crown levels, too," he says. Snell says a growing number of younger lawyers have come forward looking for legal aid cases since the rate was bumped up. "The senior lawyers aren't all that enthused. The people who have always taken legal aid cases are willing to take more," he says, noting there are 132 private bar lawyers on its roster. Allan Fineblit, CEO of the Law Society of Manitoba, says he's not surprised private bar lawyers are doing less legal aid work because the compensation they receive is a fraction of what they can earn at their fi rms. He says while he knows of many lawyers who take on legal aid cases out of a sense of duty, their capacity for such work is reduced by the amount of high-paying work at their doorstep. — GEOFF KIRBYSON gmkirbyson@shaw.ca CONFLICTS ARISING IN CROCUS SAGA T he never-ending saga of the Cro- cus Investment Fund has been a boon to the legal community in Winnipeg, but the large number of parties requiring representation has unearthed numerous confl icts of inter- est and forced some people to go out of province to fi nd a lawyer. The failed labour-sponsored fund ceased trading more than three years ago amid valuation concerns, but a pending $200-million class action lawsuit and a recently released report from its receiver have made it a courthouse mainstay. Ri- chard Buchwald, a partner at Pitblado LLP in Winnipeg, says confl icts of this sort are not uncommon in a market the size of Winnipeg. He says it's also diffi cult for parties who don't necessarily have an ongoing relationship with legal counsel to fi nd a lawyer to represent them on the Crocus fi le who is not confl icted. "The net result is for larger types of commercial litigation, there's a need to go out of province. It's unfortunate when [the work] has to leave the jurisdiction. There are excellent lawyers in Manitoba who are as capable as anywhere else," he says. For example, PricewaterhouseCoo- pers, Crocus's auditor, is represented by www. C ANADIAN Law ye rmag.com JANU AR Y 2008 9