B.C. Lawyers Just Voted to Open the Bill 21 Paper Trail
The Law Society’s own members backed delayed disclosure of government-regulator correspondence around the NDP’s legal-regulator overhaul. That is a public-confidence warning, not a technical footnote.
B.C.’s legal-regulator fight has moved from the courtroom into the paper trail. Law Society of British Columbia members have passed a resolution calling for delayed disclosure of formal written correspondence between the Law Society and the Attorney General or executive government on regulatory policy, governance and proposed legislation affecting the legal profession.
The numbers matter. The Law Society’s AGM results page says Resolution 4, submitted by Kyla Lee and Paul Doroshenko, KC, passed with 1,201 votes in favour and 576 opposed, or 67.6 per cent support among those voting on that resolution. That is not unanimous. It is enough, however, to show that a large share of voting lawyers want the relationship between government and regulator put on a clearer public record.
The resolution’s target is specific: the NDP government’s Legal Professions Act, formerly Bill 21. B.C.’s statute book says the Act was assented to on May 16, 2024. The AGM notice says the introduction and passage of Bill 21 were preceded by communications between government and the Law Society that were not disclosed to members at the time, and that members have since expressed that earlier disclosure would have allowed more meaningful engagement with the legislative process.
That is the accountability issue. The NDP did not merely adjust a small administrative rule. The Legal Professions Act creates a transition toward Legal Professions British Columbia and includes a transitional board, a transitional Indigenous council and an advisory committee. Those are major governance changes for the body that regulates lawyers, notaries and paralegals. When government changes the structure around the legal profession, the public has a direct interest in knowing who said what, when, and on what terms.
The proposed transparency policy is not reckless disclosure. It asks for formal written correspondence to be released within six months, with carve-outs for solicitor-client privilege, litigation privilege, settlement privilege, personal privacy, investigations, legal prohibitions and prejudice to ongoing litigation. It also seeks retrospective disclosure back to January 1, 2022, with historical records released on a rolling basis.
The litigation is still active. The Canadian Bar Association B.C. Branch timeline says the appeal hearing on constitutional challenges to the Legal Professions Act is set for November 16 and 17, 2026, and lists Court of Appeal intervenor applications heard on September 9 and 10. The Law Society has said it appealed after the B.C. Supreme Court dismissed its constitutional challenge on April 29, 2026.
Victoria can argue its legal position in court. But outside court, public confidence demands daylight. If the NDP’s legal-regulator overhaul was developed cleanly, delayed disclosure should help prove it. If the record is more complicated, British Columbians deserve to see that too.