31420-12-1 SAWRIDGE, Indian vs. ROLAND, Twinn et al

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1 Public Trustee’s Office would be in if they had an obligation or had created a practice or
2 a standard where they acted for all unrepresented minors in any case where they didn’t
3 have representation available to them at the cost of the Public Trustee’s Office. Frankly,
4 the resources that would be required there would, I suspect, far exceed the resources of
5 the Youth Criminal Defence Office and simply do not reflect the reality of the Public
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Trustee’s Office at this time, My Lord.
8 Just because I’m at that point in our brief, My Lord, we’ve identified starting at paragraph
9 71ofour original brief and going through to paragraph 78 that there might be a need for
10 direction from the Court about a potential conflict of interest between the two groups of
11 minors. My friend Mr. Poretti and my friend Ms. Bonora have clarified that in fact
12 there -- it’s not the case that there’s a group of minors that will lose their beneficiary
13 status and a different group of minors that will gain. We’re only dealing with minors that
14 will lose their beneficiary status. So indeed, our initial understanding of Mr. Bujold’s
15 evidence appears to be incorrect and we apologize to the Court for that. We haven’t
16 examined on the affidavit yet. And there had been some confusion on this point
17 throughout. So I appreciate my friends’ clarification. It does not appear that there is any
18 imminent or apparent complicate of interest between any of the groups of minors that the
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Public Trustee has identified at this point in time.
21 Then beginning at paragraph 79 of our submissions, My Lord, we’re dealing with the
22 condition that the Public Trustee is requesting in relation to its appointment to be
23 granted -- to be granted indemnity for its solicitor client costs for the entire proceeding.
24 And my friends have responded to those submissions extensively and very thoroughly.
25 And then we’ve responded -- I can just take you -- we’ve responded to those submissions,
26 My Lord, in our reply brief starting at paragraph 48 of the brief and carrying through until
27 paragraph 62 of the brief. And certainly, My Lord, I’m not standing before this Court to
28 try and suggest that Okanagan is not the case on advance costs. It clearly is. It’s the
29 tripartite test that’s applied in the vast -- well, the vast majority of cases. Iwould stand
30 before this Court and suggest to you that we’re dealing with a very unique situation. I’ve
31 been unable to locate any authority where the court has been asked to consider an advance
32 costs application or indemnity for solicitor client costs throughout the entire proceeding on
33 the basis that the Court’s parens patriae jurisdiction has been engaged. And so we
34 certainly take that position with the Court that this -- and I apologize, My Lord, I’m
35 getting ahead of myself. The L.C. case, and that’s the first L.C. decision that you find at
36 Tab 9ofour authorities, it does deal with the Okanagan case, My Lord. Iwas struck,
37 quite frankly, that the Court didn’t apply perhaps as stringent a standard of the Okanagan
38 case as it does in some. And indeed, Justice Graesser comments on, in paragraph 75, that
39 he does not require the same level of detail of impecuniosity as was required in the cases
40 he cites. And that those are cases seeking (INDISCERNIBLE) bottom findings which
41 apply adifferent test. And we don’t -- we don’t, unfortunately, have a great deal of detail