Rightswatch Conference 2012 – Civil Liberties:  People, Power and Protest

October 12 – 13, 2012
REGISTRATION - www.ccla.org/events/rightswatch-2012<http://www.ccla.org/events/rightswatch-2012>

Now in its 4th year, the national RightsWatch conference will be held in Montreal, Quebec, October 12-13th 2012. This year the conference will be co-hosted by the Canadian Civil Liberties Association and the Centre for Human Rights and Legal Pluralism at McGill, and will take place at the McGill Faculty of Law.

This year the conference is entitled Civil Liberties: People, Power and Protest and a wide range of national and international speakers will be invited to share their perspectives on numerous facets of this theme.  The conference is designed to expose law students, lawyers, and those interested in civil liberties and human rights issues to the important public interest cases and issues that are constantly arising in our society and encourage them to think critically about these issues. Prominent speakers from academic institutions, law firms, government and national and international public interest organizations will be sharing their perspectives on a variety of subjects.

The CCLA has applied for the continuing education accreditation from the Quebec Bar – please check the conference website for the most recent update.
Agenda

•         Friday evening keynote by Hon. Romeo Saganash, Member of Parliament, Abitibi—Baie-James—Nunavik—Eeyou
•         Voting with your feet: democracy, freedom of peaceful assembly and civil disobedience. Panelists include Professor Jamie Cameron, Osgoode Hall Law School, Professor Dominique Clement, University of Alberta and Jacinthe Poisson, student at McGill Faculty of Law
•         Policing and Protest: International Perspectives. Panelists include James Welch, Legal Director at Liberty (United Kingdom), Sheldon Magardie, Cape Town Regional Director with the Legal Resources Centre (South Africa), and Luciana Pol, Centro de Estudios Legales y Sociales (Argentina)
•         From racial to social profiling in policing? Panelists include Fo Niemi, Executive Director of the Centre for Action on Race Relations, Noël Saint-Pierre, lawyer, Professor Paul Eid, l’Université du Québec à Montréal and Professor Lucie Lemonde, Université du Québec à Montréal
•         Privacy and the right to dissent: new technology, new techniques, new concerns? Panelists include Paul Champ, Champ & Associates,  Stephen McCammon, counsel with the Information and Privacy Commissioner of Ontario and a representative from the Service de police de la Ville de Montréal
•         Police oversight and accountability – changing the expectations, evaluating the models. Panelists include David Eby, Executive Director, BC Civil Liberties Association, Professor Kent Roach, University of Toronto Faculty of Law, and Gerry McNeilly, Director of the Office of the Independent Police Review Director
•         Peaceful assembly and protest:  The view from Québec. This session was organized in collaboration with the Quebec branch of the Canadian Bar Association. Panelists include Professor Christian Brunelle, Université Laval, Annick Desjardins, lawyer, Canadian Union of Public Employees, and Jennifer Turner, Human Rights Researcher, American Civil Liberties Union

All conference proceedings will take place at McGill Faculty of Law.  Sessions are planned in both English and French, with simultaneous translation for as many panels as possible.

To learn more and register, visit www.ccla.org/events/rightswatch-2012<http://www.ccla.org/events/rightswatch-2012>