Cabinet’s latest budget bill is unlikely to survive a court challenge, lawyers have written the Senate, according to Blacklock's Reporter. One clause of the bill would require lawyers to report clients to the Canada Revenue Agency..“This requirement would infringe upon solicitor-client privilege and the duty of loyalty that legal professionals owe to their clients by putting them in a potential conflict of interest,” the Federation of Law Societies wrote the Senate national finance committee. The clause is “unlikely to survive a constitutional challenge,” it said..The clause is contained in Bill C-32 An Act To Implement Certain Provisions Of The Fall Economic Statement. The bill has yet to pass either the Senate or House of Commons..Law Societies cited a section of the 172-page bill requiring that counsel report to tax collectors their “client-specific trust accounts” including names and addresses. “The Supreme Court of Canada has held legal professionals when acting in that capacity must not be required to report their clients’ affairs to the government,” wrote the Law Societies..The Canadian Bar Association also petitioned the Senate committee to rewrite the bill. “Lawyers and notaries are already heavily regulated when holding clients’ funds in trust accounts,” wrote the Association..The Association said Canadians must be assured of confidentiality when conducting business with a lawyer. “This principle allows clients from all walks of life to communicate freely and in confidence with their lawyers in a trusted environment in order to receive the best legal advice possible,” it wrote..“Protecting full and frank communication between lawyers and their clients promotes the public interest in the observance of law and respect for the administration of justice,” said the Association. The Department of Finance has not publicly commented on the protests..The Supreme Court in a 2016 ruling said even lawyers’ billings were shielded from auditors. “Professional secrecy is a principle of fundamental justice,” wrote the Court. “Professional secrecy must thus remain as close to absolute as possible and the courts must adopt stringent standards to protect it.”.The decision came in the case of Duncan Thompson, a Cardston, Alta. lawyer who invoked privilege in refusing to disclose to the Canada Revenue Agency his clients’ names and billable hours they were charged. Thompson instead submitted accounts listing only income, expenses and assets..“This was an important case for defining the parameters of solicitor-client privilege,” Adam Dodek, former dean of the University of Ottawa law faculty, said in an interview at the time. “It is the first time the Supreme Court is called upon to interpret solicitor-client privilege under the Income Tax Act in the Charter era.”
