Child and youth law seems to many a nebulous area of law. It is about child protection? Is it about youth criminal justice? Is it about family issues? Is it about health care issues? The reality: all of the above, and more.
The child and youth law section takes an explicit children’s rights lens on all matters law and policy, putting children and youth at the centre of professional practice to make sure their rights are respected and decisions are made in their best interests.
To better understand why members of the OBA Child and Youth Law Section do what they do, I sat down with some section executive members to hear what brought them to child and youth law and why they volunteer with the Section. If you’re feeling even a little inspired by these profiles, nominate yourself for the section executive in the upcoming Section elections, and invite your colleagues across all areas of practice to join the OBA and enrol in the Child and Youth Law Section.
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“The family unit is the fundamental unit in society. We ignore a huge part of the family when we ignore the voice of a child.”
Christine Marchetti is the current Chair of the OBA Child and Youth Law Section. In her 21st year of practice as a family lawyer, Christine started out working in child protection and as a panel member for the Office of the Children’s Lawyer. Christine has a real interest in how to solve contact issues between children and parents. Contact issues are a very complicated area of the law, and require a real balance to respect the views and preferences of children, in particular the autonomy and consent of older children. Christine has been active in the OBA since 2018, first in the Family Law Section and now also in the Child and Youth Law Section. To Christine, the OBA is an inclusive and representative organization that is the go-to for lawyers in Ontario. Participating in the Child and Youth Law Section helps Christine to better understand how the various legislative regimes lawyers work with intersect when they talk about children’s rights, whatever area of law one might work in.
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“It’s an interesting intersection of different areas, things that come together: education, criminal justice, family, child protection, social work—different professionals coming together and looking across Sections and disciplines.”
Carina Chan is the Vice-Chair of the OBA Child and Youth Law Section. Carina is a partner at Burrison Hudani Doris LLP, a family law firm in Toronto. She represents children and youth through the Office of the Children’s Lawyer and has built a family mediation practice. She is also the co-general editor of the Wilson on Children and the Law publication for LexisNexis Canada. Outside her legal practice, Carina is involved in community initiatives related to child welfare that help young people act as first voice advocates for systemic change to child welfare systems. She appreciates the Child and Youth Law Section because, as a lawyer in family law, a lot of cases involve children but children aren’t always centred in the decisions that affect them. Even for those representing adults, it’s useful to attend Child and Youth Law Section events to reflect on ways all lawyers can work together for children. Everyone involved needs to zoom out and think of the child as a person. As a member of the Child and Youth Law Section executive, Carina hopes to grow the section and bring an interdisciplinary lens to programming across areas of law.
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“It’s about challenging presumptions we have about children.”
Kenneth Atkinson is a CPD Liaison for the OBA Child and Youth Law Section. Kenneth’s entire career as a lawyer has been about children’s rights and child protection law. He was counsel for two different children’s aid societies before joining the Office of the Children’s Lawyer, where today he is in-house counsel. He represents children in child protection cases and domestic family law cases, and is also one of the of the co-managers of the Office’s adoption and openness files. He has a particular interest in looking at ways that we can centre the voice of the child in matters affecting children. Kenneth joined the OBA Child and Youth Law Section because it offers a meaningful opportunity to engage with likeminded colleagues. To Kenneth, there’s something enriching about connecting with fellow lawyers who come from different practice areas but are committed and interested in promoting children’s rights. It’s about respecting the personhood of children as full individuals—people of today—who have rights that are to be respected and who should have a say about the important decisions in their lives.
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“Get our content out to people beyond our Section! People working in all areas would benefit from a children’s rights lens.”
Allison P. Williams is a CPD Liaison for the OBA Child and Youth Law Section. She is a lawyer at Justice for Children and Youth (JFCY) (currently on leave). JFCY is an Ontario-based speciality community legal clinic with a province-wide mandate, serving children under 18 years old as well as unstably housed youth up to 25 years old. JFCY clients are often faced with multiple, intersecting legal issues. One classic example may be the young person struggling at school, potentially due to an unaccommodated disability, whose behaviour results in school discipline and a criminal charge. In the course of human rights, education and youth criminal representation, it may become apparent that the child may also have caregiver issues at home and needs CAS supports, or has an unaddressed immigration issue. For Allison, the Child and Youth Law Section is a great space for networking with people who have expertise working with children and young people across practice areas. It allows Section members to fill up their toolkit with children’s rights knowledge and expertise, and can lead to helpful referrals that ensure excellent legal services to children and youth. Moreover, the OBA offers opportunities to contribute to policy and law reform as it relates to children in a structured and structural way, and to learn from helpful CPD programming that explores the intersections of children’s rights in the law.
Any article or other information or content expressed or made available in this Section is that of the respective author(s) and not of the OBA.