In the summer of 2019 we hired a UBC law student through the Public Interest Work Placement Program funded annually by the Law Foundation of BC.

Madeline Northcote (Summer #3 student) had just previously worked a semester with the UBC Indigenous Community Legal Clinic in Vancouver. During conversations she introduced myself and Patricia Barkaskus (then ICLC Academic Director) regarding community engagement to talk to communities about their experiences with Gladue, if any.

• This led to a visit to Bella Coola by lawyers Patricia and Dallas Tooshkenig to host meetings with local people (see photo #1 on Workshop photo carousal). This was a great chance for lawyers to learn from people and people to learn from lawyers. We finished with a catered Salmon meal at Tallheo Cannery, 3 km across the ocean channel from the village.
• This visit further led to us inviting Patricia to attend the Heiltsuk/Haida Women’s Gathering with us that Fall, where Patricia led a discussion about Indigenous women and their legal rights.
• This in turn led to our production of a Zoom Webinar by lawyers Patricia, Carly Teillet and Vicky Love that we shared with women’s groups in Bella Coola and Klemtu, to great response!

The overall and lasting result was more Indigenous community members, local service providers and leadership became familiar with Gladue rights and the lawyers learned about the challenges of supporting Gladue rights in small remote communities.

A happy outcome included Patricia Barkaskas signing on to be the BCLAP Supervising Lawyer and, as well, the Supervising Lawyer for our booklet Legal 2022).

Keep your minds and your hearts open and outreach stories can be built…

The Notary Foundation of BC and the International Centre for Criminal Law Reform and Criminal Justice Policy were, respectively, our funders.