IHRP

U of T responds to independent review of search process for IHRP director

Christopher.Sorensen — Mon, 29 Mar 2021 13:22:23 +0000

U of T responds to independent review of search process for IHRP director

Christopher.Sorensen Mon, 03/29/2021 - 09:22

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U of T News Team

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Faculty of Law

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IHRP

Meric Gertler

External influence played no role in the decision to discontinue the recruitment of a preferred candidate for the role of director of the International Human Rights Program (IHRP) at the University of Toronto’s Faculty of Law.

That is the conclusion of an independent review by the Honourable Thomas A. Cromwell CC, former justice of the Supreme Court of Canada, into the search process for the professional position.

Cromwell found that then-dean of the Faculty of Law Edward Iacobucci determined he could not accept the recommendation of the search committee in September 2020 due to legal constraints on hiring a non-Canadian residing outside the country and the timing needs for the director role. A conversation between a U of T alumnus and an advancement professional about the preferred candidate did not play any part in the decision, he noted.

President Meric Gertler, who asked Cromwell to conduct the review, called it a turning point for the community, and said the university will implement all of the recommendations in the report, which was released on March 29.

“While those involved in the search acted in good faith, we can all agree that certain things should have been done differently,” he said. “At the same time, I would like to emphasize my confidence in the power of the community’s shared values and the goodwill that motivates its members to achieve the reconciliation we all desire.”

Some blamed the failed search on what they called interference from the alumnus, and expressed concern about an encroachment on academic freedom, the report noted.

“I would not draw the inference that external influence played any role in the decision to discontinue the recruitment of the preferred candidate,” concluded Cromwell. “The inference that such influence played a role in that decision is the basis of the concern about academic freedom but, as I see it, that inference is not justified.”

The report also noted that the dean was not able to respond fully due to legal constraints related to protection of privacy and the need to adhere to the university’s confidentiality principles regarding searches.

President Gertler acknowledged the difficult position that Iacobucci was in throughout the controversy, since he was not able to respond to concerns or correct misinformation. “The report provides the factual comprehensiveness and analysis needed to clarify and settle key aspects of this controversial matter,” he said.

While some alleged an offer of employment had been rescinded, Mr. Cromwell concluded that, though negotiations were at an advanced stage, no formal offer in the legal sense was made and no accepted offer was rescinded.

Iacobucci announced in February 2020, before the search began, that consistent with the timeline he indicated when he accepted his renewal, he would step down as dean on Dec. 31, 2020 to pursue his research and return to the professoriate. Among his many achievements as dean, he expanded experiential learning opportunities for students and greatly enhanced student financial aid.

In his 77-page report, Cromwell recommended that the university improve its policies and procedures around confidentiality, and engage in a reconciliation process – both internally within the Faculty of Law and with the preferred candidate – to heal the “deep wounds” the controversy has left in its wake. President Gertler said he has already sent a written apology to the candidate regarding the confidentiality breaches, which were not consistent with the university’s high standards and best practices. The provost, the vice-president of human resources and equity, the vice-president of advancement and Jutta Brunnée, the new dean of the Faculty of Law, will work to implement the report’s other recommendations.

Brunnée, who began her term as dean of the Faculty of Law on Jan. 1, 2021 and was not part of the search process, said the report speaks for itself.

“I share Mr. Cromwell’s optimism that we can build on a common commitment to the university’s values as we work to improve how we communicate and resolve differences,” she said. She is launching a series of conversations within the faculty to facilitate a reconciliation following a difficult period for faculty, students and staff.

The report outlined how the university could strengthen its search processes, including ensuring selection committees sign confidentiality agreements and record key decisions reached in meetings.

It also acknowledged that professional staff, especially in human rights and public interest law clinics, who are in the business of taking on controversial and unpopular causes, may make professional decisions that cause discomfort to powerful people, groups and institutions, and may require the university’s support to enable them to undertake such work.

The university should “re-affirm that attempts by anyone – lobby groups, corporations and donors – to block, prevent or disqualify an applicant in a hiring process on the basis of the candidate’s religious or political views, scholarly or other public work or social activism must be firmly rejected…,” the report noted.

It recommended U of T develop explicit policies or protocols as to how to handle any inquiries made by an alumnus or others regarding a recruitment process.

The university is committed to addressing these issues, said President Gertler.

Professor Emerita Rebecca Cook, founder of the IHRP, currently serves as the IHRP’s interim head. She has been meeting with faculty, students, alumni and staff to gather recommendations about how to further strengthen the popular program, which was founded in 1987 as Canada’s first international human rights clinic.

“The IHRP is a key part of our international and experiential offerings,” said Brunnée. “Students greatly value the opportunities it provides. I look forward to positioning the IHRP to be better yet, and to relaunching the clinic component of the IHRP as soon as possible.”

The program works to enhance the legal protection of existing and emerging international human rights obligations through advocacy, knowledge-exchange and capacity-building initiatives. It provides experiential learning opportunities for students, and legal expertise to civil society.

“Ottawa needs to move quickly”: U of T report calls to end immigration detention of children

vzaretski — Thu, 22 Sep 2016 17:28:23 +0000

“Ottawa needs to move quickly”: U of T report calls to end immigration detention of children

vzaretski Thu, 09/22/2016 - 13:28

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Veronica Zaretski

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Veronica Zaretski

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international human rights program

IHRP

child detention

Since 2010, hundreds of immigrant children in Canada have suffered from trauma and mental health illness while housed in immigration detention centres, say researchers from the international human rights program (IHRP) at U of T’s Faculty of Law.

“The immigration detention of children does nothing to increase public safety, but has an immensely detrimental and lasting impact on an already vulnerable population,” says Samer Muscati, director of the IHRP. “Instead of locking children up or separating them from their detained parents, these children need meaningful protection in community-based alternatives to detention.”

The “No Life for a Child” report, released today by the IHRP researchers, says that Canada is violating its international legal obligations by separating children from their parents and placing them in immigration detention facilities, which the report says can resemble medium-security prisons.

The report is grabbing headlines here in Toronto and around the world.

Read the Guardian story

Read the Toronto Star story

According to figures obtained by the IHRP through access to information requests, an average of 242 children were detained each year between 2010 and 2014. That number is an underestimate and does not account for all children living with their parents in detention as “guests.”

“It’s a very disempowering environment,” says Hanna Gros, a recent graduate from U of T's Faculty of Law, IHRP researcher and co-author of the report. “They are deprived of the environment and education that they need to develop normally,” she says. “Their imagination is confined to the walls of the prison.”

Rachel Kronick, a psychiatrist at Jewish General Hospital in the division of child psychiatry at McGill University, visited immigration holding centres as a researcher. She says that the children and parents that she spoke to felt that the experience of being held in these immigration holding centres was one of powerlessness, humiliation and uncertainty. She observed significant mental health problems in both parents and children.

“Currently, there are no mental health supports available for detainees, aside from one-off psychiatric assessments,” she says. “But more important to underline is that while mental health supports would be helpful, it is the detention itself which is the source of harm.”

Kronick says that providing counselling is laudable, but is not enough. “Children and parents need to be protected from the harms of detention itself,” she says.

Detained children include refugee claimants from Syria and other war-torn regions, as well as some children who have Canadian citizenship, say researchers.

The researchers interviewed a child who they named Michel (his real name was not used to protect his identity) who spent his first 28 months living in a Toronto detention facility.

Michel’s mother was detained when she was two-months pregnant with him. Canada Border Services Agency (CBSA) suspected that she was a flight risk, the IHRP researchers say. But after giving birth to Michel (who is a Canadian citizen born in Canada), she and her son were detained for nearly three years before their deportation in late 2015.

Gros says Michel’s first words were “shift change,” words he often heard the guards at the detention facility say. She says detained children would be searched by guards every time they returned to the facility after spending time outside.

“Michel knew the routine and automatically put his hands up every time,” she says. “He didn’t even realize that it was not right for a little boy to be searched by a guard every time he came back from the playground.”

“When people are deprived of their liberty, it’s so disempowering,” Gros says. “These episodes are highly traumatic for children when they’re detained for 48 hours, let alone for months or years.”

The researchers hope that the federal government’s and CBSA’s recent willingness to reform the immigration detention regime will prevent other stories like Michel’s.

The government and CBSA are showing a focus on protecting children and addressing mental health issues, according to the report, which also notes that the government has expressed an intention to engage extensively with non-governmental organizations in the process of revising policy and programs.

“After years of silence and inaction, the Canadian government and CBSA are taking serious steps that will hopefully bring us closer to ending child detention and family separation,” says Gros. “But Ottawa needs to move quickly and deliberately to end the needless suffering of children and their parents.”

“It is the fact of detention, not the condition of detention, that is the ultimate problem,” she says. “Investing a lot of money to improve facilities is not going to improve the situation. We need to address the root of the problem – detention itself.”

Gros says that CBSA cases are complex and diverse. “There isn’t a binary solution of either release or detention to address these cases,” she says. “But there are a wide range of alternatives to detention that still allow children and families to live in communities where their fundamental human rights are not deprived,” she says. Gros also notes that less than two per cent of cases involving children are a risk of danger to the public.

Yolanda Song, a third-year student completing her J.D. degree at the Faculty of Law who co-authored the report, says that officials can take steps to address the problem even before legislative changes are made. “CBSA officers and authorities need to focus on the best interest of the child when they make the decision to arrest, detain or release someone.”

The 70-page report builds on the recommendations of the IHRP’s 2015 report, “We Have No Rights,” and makes 11 recommendations to ensure that Canada complies with its international human rights obligations.

It concludes that children and families with children should be released from detention or accommodated in community-based alternatives to detention. These include electronic monitoring, reporting obligations, financial deposits and guarantors.

“Canada should be aligned with international requirements that place the best interest of children as the primary consideration in all state action that concern children,” Gros says. “Currently the system falls short for children who are de facto detained, who are invisible in the system.”