Lawyers called to the Bar in one province who want to practise in another province in Canada can generally do so with ease these days.
Thanks to the National Mobility Agreement (NMA), which was signed on July 1, 2003 and implemented in most provinces in 2006, the process for lawyers looking to work in other provinces has become much more streamlined than it used to be.
The NMA is an agreement among the provincial law societies designed to facilitate temporary and permanent mobility of lawyers between Canadian jurisdictions.
"Prior to the signing of the National Mobility Agreement, lawyers called to the Bar in one province who wanted to practise in another province had to write transfer exams, essentially write the Bar Ads. The NMA eliminated this hurdle," says Frederica Wilson, director, policy and public affairs at the Federation of Law Societies of Canada (FLSC).
According to the FLSC’s website, in August 2001, the FLSC established a National Mobility Task Force to examine full mobility rights and conditions for lawyers to practise law in all Canadian jurisdictions. In August 2002, the FLSC accepted the report of the task force, which recommended the implementation of full mobility rights for Canadian lawyers. On July 1, 2003, the National Mobility Agreement came into effect, making it significantly easier for a lawyer called in one province to practise law in another province.
Signatories to the new agreement include the law societies of B.C., Alberta, Saskatchewan, Manitoba, Newfoundland and Labrador, Nova Scotia and Ontario. The Barreau du Québec also signed the agreement, though as a civil law jurisdiction, different criteria apply.
"Under the agreement, lawyers who are called to the Bar in one province who want to practise in another province, simply have to make an application to the other province’s law society showing that they are in good standing and provide a good character reference," Wilson explains.
Instead of writing transfer exams, lawyers called to the Bar in one province who apply to practise law in another province must read the provincial Bar admission materials and provide a signed affidavit to certify that they have reviewed and understood the reading materials required by the jurisdiction.
Another important component of the agreement is the coordination of professional liability insurance coverage for lawyers practising in each others’ jurisdictions. Lawyers who are called to the Bar in one province, but who provide legal advice in another province on a temporary basis (i.e. less than 100 days in a calendar year) are not required to take out additional liability insurance beyond that in effect in their home signatory jurisdiction.
As of Nov. 3, 2006, nine jurisdictions within Canada (B.C., Alberta, Saskatchewan, Manitoba, Ontario, Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, P.E.I. and Newfoundland) fully implemented the NMA. The Barreau du Québec has signed the NMA, but has not yet implemented it.
Owing to the fact that Quebec is a civil law jurisdiction, lawyers who are called to the Bar in one province who apply to practise in Quebec face additional hurdles. Nevertheless, lawyers called in one province can with relative ease apply to the Barreau du Québec to register as Canadian Legal Advisors in Quebec.
"Any lawyer who is practising in a province of Canada can become a member of the Quebec Bar as a Canadian Legal Advisor, which allows the lawyer to practise federal law, the law of their jurisdiction of origin or public law" explains Stéphane Rivard, president of the FLSC.
Currently, lawyers called in provinces outside Quebec who apply to become full members of the Barreau du Québec are instructed to write some or all of the province’s Bar admission exams.
"Most lawyers from other provinces who want to practise in Quebec are typically assigned to write three exams," Wilson says.
Rivard noted that the FLSC is working on draft legislation that would ease restrictions for out-of-province lawyers who want to practise in Quebec and vice versa.
Transferring from Ontario to B.C. with a few glitches
hen Jonathan Weisman, a former litigation associate at the insurance defence boutique Gilbertson Davis Emerson LLP in Toronto transferred from Ontario to B.C. in August, he found the process to be fairly easy — apart from a minor bureaucratic snag.The newly married Weisman decided to move to B.C. this summer because his wife, a pediatrician with a speciality in gastroenterology, received a position at a teaching hospital in Vancouver.
Weisman prepared the $1,200 application fee to the Law Society of British Columbia and obtained a character reference from a current member of the Bar of Ontario. Up to this point the process went smoothly. But Weisman also needed to obtain a certificate demonstrating that he was in good standing with the Law Society of Upper Canada (LSUC), with no outstanding law society fees or legal malpractice fees.
While obtaining a good character reference was not a problem for Weisman, requesting a certificate of good standing from the LSUC turned into an odyssey that took weeks to resolve.
"The law society wouldn’t accept credit card payment over the phone for the $50 fee to request a certificate of good standing," Weisman explains. He attempted to place his order online, but he had forgotten his password. The online password retrieval program failed to work. He called the LSUC again, but they refused to provide him with his password over the phone, citing security reasons. The society informed Weisman that his records did not show any e-mail address and offered to update the records to include one. This appeared to be the problem with the password retrieval program.
Over the next two weeks, Weisman checked his online profile repeatedly to determine whether the e-mail address had been added. "It took two weeks for LSUC to process and input the data," Weisman says with frustration. After finally making sure that his e-mail was in the system, he tried to use the online password retrieval form again, but it failed to work.
After another call to the law society, Weisman was informed that he could request the certificate of standing by e-mail. "Had they told me that earlier, it would have saved a lot of time and effort," Weisman says. He sent the obligatory e-mail and waited.
Not much later, he received his certificate of standing in the mail, only to discover that his name had been misspelled, despite the fact that his name was correctly spelled on the envelope enclosing it. The certificate contained no other identifying information.
Weisman called the society and left a message for the official responsible for preparing the certificates advising them of the error and asking that a new certificate be forwarded. Two weeks later he received the new certificate.
Weisman has since accepted a position with a B.C. firm and will soon begin practising in the new jurisdiction.
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