Issue link: https://digital.canadianlawyermag.com/i/642579
It was during law school at Osgoode Hall that Frances Mahon first experienced the challenges and rewards of public interest law. Working as a research assistant for Professor Alan Young, and later with Marlys Edwardh at Goldblatt Partners, she was part of the team that successfully challenged three of Canada's prostitution laws before the Supreme Court. Only a second year associate, Mahon is outspoken about her public interest work in criminal defense and constitutional litigation, and says about fifty percent of her time is devoted to pro bono cases. "I would say from a really broad perspective my entire practice revolves around access to justice issues," she says. Among her current cases, Mahon is representing a group of gay law students and lawyers known as the OUTlaws, as well as a group called Out On Bay Street, as interveners in the Trinity Western accreditation case at the Ontario Court of Appeal. "We're there to show the court how important it is for members of the LGBTQ community to attend law school," Mahon says. "And not to have to disavow aspects of their identity." Mahon's Goldblatt Partners colleague Nadine Blum is doing different but equally important public interest work. She and senior partner Ethan Poskanzer helped found the Four Villages legal clinic, in partnership with Four Villages Community Health Centre and Pro Bono Law Ontario. Volunteers from the firm staff it advising in all areas of employment law for non- unionized workers. "You can have rights that are very generous," Blum says. "But those rights are meaningless for a lot of employees, because of circumstances where they have no real power." Both Blum and Mahon believe that the impediments to justice equality stretch far beyond the cost of legal services. "Financial issues are a barrier but so are the real disparities in power in society," Blum says. "I am a very out, Queer person and most people who retain me know that," adds Mahon. "They want a lawyer who's going to understand the impact of the inequalities they face on their lives and their cases." Frances Mahon and Nadine Blum 18 FLIP YOUR WIG