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Over the past six months, the LEAF team – like so many others around the world – has been learning to navigate the new realities of life during this pandemic. While we continue to do most of our work from home, we are ramping up for a very busy fall.
The pandemic has not slowed us down at LEAF. Indeed, as we have come to understand that COVID-19’s impacts have been especially devastating for women, particularly those who experience intersecting inequalities based on race, Indigeneity, disability, class, and immigration status, it has furthered our resolve to address structural and systemic discrimination that undermines substantive equality. Despite the challenges posed by COVID-19, we at LEAF are continuing our work to advance gender equality rights and feminist principles before the courts, the government and the public. Thanks to all of you for your continued support; we couldn’t do any of this without you.
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In this newsletter, we:
- share a sneak peek at LEAF’s new branding, which we will be slowly rolling out this fall, culminating in the launch of our new website in November;
- celebrate an important win concerning equality and sentencing for Indigenous women at the Court of Appeal for Ontario;
- reflect on a more disappointing decision where the same court did not give adequate consideration to the equality rights and security interests of women and children;
- announce an exciting new research project on Universal Basic Income; and
- provide further updates on our fall plans!
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LEAF's New Look!
We’re excited to announce that LEAF is rebranding with a new logo, colour scheme, and website - you’re getting a first look here!
As LEAF enters its 35th year of seeking to advance the rights of women and girls, we felt it was time to modernize LEAF’s look.
We set out to create a new brand that better reflects LEAF’s current work, evolving culture, and dynamic nature. The new logo stems from the “living tree” doctrine of constitutional interpretation - meaning the ability of the constitution to evolve and change to reflect new realities of our society and to address the challenges as they arise. The different coloured segments in the tree represent the diversity of women’s experiences and intersecting oppressions that LEAF works to rectify. While the outer shape is symmetrical, the inside components are not – highlighting the imbalance of the law and LEAF’s righting its shortcomings through its work. Our new website, set to launch in November 2020, will reflect this new look and feel.
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The Substantive Equality Bulletin
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LEAF, in a coalition consisting of DisAbled Women’s Network Canada and ARCH Disability Law Centre, filed written submissions to the Supreme Court of Canada in R. v. Slatter, to advocate for the substantive equality rights of women labelled with intellectual disabilities. This case involves a woman who disclosed that she had been sexually assaulted. At trial, defence counsel argued, largely on the basis of evidence rooted in generalizations and stereotypes about intellectual disabilities, that she was more suggestible and her testimony was not reliable. While the trial judge convicted the accused, the majority of the Ontario Court of Appeal ordered a new trial finding that the trial judge had failed to adequately address the issue of her suggestibility.
We welcome you to tune into the hearing of this appeal, which will be live-streamed on the Supreme Court of Canada’s website. It is tentatively scheduled for November 6, 2020.
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LEAF & West Coast LEAF submitted arguments to the Supreme Court in Colucci v. Colucci to ensure that Courts understand the impact of unpaid child support on women and children’s substantive equality when assessing applications to retroactively decrease outstanding payments. Child support in Canada is dramatically underpaid and overwhelmingly gendered. The economic destinies of women and children are intertwined, as most children continue to live with their mothers. In the vast majority of cases, it is the father who is supposed to pay child support to the mother, and it is the father who fails to do so. Unpaid child support payments contribute to child poverty, as well as women’s socioeconomic inequality.
Feel free to watch the hearing, which will be live-streamed on the Supreme Court of Canada’s website. It is tentatively scheduled for November 4, 2020.
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In July, we celebrated the decision of the Court of Appeal for Ontario in R. v. Sharma, a case in which LEAF intervened jointly with the Asper Centre. The Court struck down sections of the Criminal Code that eliminated the possibility of conditional sentences (a community-based alternative to a prison sentence) for certain offences, finding this infringed Ms. Sharma’s equality rights. This judgment will serve as a small step towards reducing the overincarceration of Indigenous people – in particular, Indigenous women.
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LEAF was disappointed by the decision in R. v. Sullivan from the Court of Appeal for Ontario, which failed to recognize the connection between concerns about a lack of accountability for intoxicated offenders and the reluctance of survivors to report their abuse. We were also concerned about the misinformation that circulated about the decision, both in the mainstream and social media, and produced a detailed infographic to help unpack this complex legal judgment.
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The Government of Canada’s Emergency Community Support Fund (through the Toronto Foundation) and the Canadian Bar Association’s Law for the Future Fund recently awarded LEAF with grants to research the potential for Universal Basic Income (UBI) to address gender inequality in Canada.
The UBI Project’s Advisory Committee will be meeting for the first time in fall 2020 – we look forward to giving our LEAF membership updates as this exciting project takes shape!
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Over the summer, LEAF co-hosted two virtual panels on the topic of technology-facilitated violence (formerly known as cybermisogyny) and its gendered impacts. Many thanks to the participants who tuned in to make the events a success!
You can access the video link to “Cybermisogyny During Times of COVID-19 and Beyond” as well as resources here.
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News from the LEAF National “Virtual” Office
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Goodbye to our Summer Intern, Mukisa Kakembo
This summer, we were fortunate have a summer intern, Mukisa Kakembo, working with us virtually from her home in Nova Scotia.
Mukisa is an African Nova Scotian woman of Ugandan heritage and a third-year student at Dalhousie University’s Schulich School of Law. Mukisa is dedicated to applying a critical race and intersectional feminist lens to her legal work to make positive systemic change in the justice system.
Thank you for all your contributions to LEAF this summer, Mukisa. We look forward to meeting in person!
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Congratulations to Nicole Biros-Bolton on becoming a licensed lawyer in Ontario
Nicole Biros-Bolton joined the LEAF team as our articling student in the summer of 2019. While articling can always feel like a gruelling process, completing the requirements to become admitted to the Bar during a pandemic when exams are being cancelled and you have young children at home takes it to a whole other level!
Despite all of the obstacles being thrown in her path, Nicole not only managed to complete all her requirements for admission to the Law Society of Ontario, she did so while continuing to be the warm, caring, team builder that she was when we shared a physical office! Her steadfast perseverance will make her an exceptional lawyer. She was officially admitted as a member of the LSO on August 28, 2020. Congratulations, Nicole!
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Upcoming Panel Discussions
LEAF’s Gender Justice Now virtual symposium will include three important panel discussions critical to equality rights litigation, which will be open to all:
- The Importance of Intersectionality – Monday October 26, 2020
- Using the Legal System to Advance the Rights of Indigenous Women and Girls – Tuesday October 27, 2020
- Opportunities for Equality Rights Litigation and Law Reform Moving Forward – Wednesday October 28, 2020
Stay tuned for additional details – including how to tune in!
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Update on the Persons Day Gala
Although we always look forward to our fall celebration with LEAF supporters, and rely on the Persons Day Gala as our biggest fundraiser, we have made the difficult decision to postpone the event until February 2021. The health and wellbeing of our supporters is our primary focus, and an in-person event of this scale still cannot happen safely in 2020. We will continue to monitor the situation and provide an update in the coming months.
In lieu of an in-person event, LEAF will host an online Speaker Series, What Makes a Person? A Critical Look at the Persons Case and its Legacy, launching on October 26th, 2020, to discuss what personhood means in 2020. While we have celebrated Persons Day in Canada for years, we recognize that many women were excluded from the definition of ‘persons’ in 1929. The first panel discussion will feature a diverse mix of esteemed speakers, including the Honourable Jody Wilson-Raybould, PC, QC, MP, Bonnie Brayton, the National Executive Director of the DisAbled Women's Network (DAWN) Canada, and more, to help unpack the longstanding obstacles to achieving ‘personhood’ for so many women. Speaker events will continue on a monthly basis through February 2021.
The events of the past year, including the global reckoning around anti-Black racism, have underscored the importance of questioning and thinking critically about the past. We need to acknowledge when there are instances that we could have done better as a society, so we can learn from them, and move forward. We hope this series can serve as a platform to discuss ongoing challenges for personhood by asking who is still left out of that concept today, who remain on the margins, and what can we do to include them. With your support and engagement, we can work together towards a more inclusive and welcoming feminism.
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Looking to deepen your understanding of intersectionality? Here are recommendations from LEAF staff:
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Books:
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Films:
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Our work is only possible with the generous support of donors like you! Donate to LEAF today and help advance gender equality in Canada. For more information, please contact Megan Cameron. Thank you for your support!
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