First let me thank Andrew Petter, Dean of Law, for inviting me to participate in this conference. The idea behind this conference is, “To bring together the many organizations and individuals in the law school community to challenge us all to think about issues of equity and diversity at law school and beyond.”

I am pleased to have been invited to speak on this topic of discrimination and the law. This is, however, is a very large topic given that the law, if we are discussing law schools and beyond, includes: lawmakers, law enforcers, and law interpreters - everyone from legislators to police, judges, prison institutions, and academics. We have statutory law, the common law, and now constitutional law, administrative law, etc.

Discrimination is likewise a very large topic. Generally, there is overt discrimination and covert discrimination. There is institutional discrimination and individual bias by police or judges and even law professors. By the way, I have done all of these jobs. I think it is best to begin with some general principles, and then move to things that I have learned over the years, and then end with some questions for you to ponder.

Underlying all of the law is the concept of justice and fairness. I think of the lady statue with her eyes covered. She is blind to racial differences, to social differences, to economic differences, to religious differences, to sexual differences, etc. In other words, everyone is equal in the eyes of the law.

What happens if justice fails? Well, if there is no justice there can be no democracy or freedoms. Everything else, I think, flows from this concept of justice. When you think of countries on a scale from one to ten, with very democratic countries as ten, I think it is safe to say that Canada scores very high, perhaps a 9.9.

So what is my experience? Well, I attended elementary school, then high school, got a job and got married, went back to university, got my degree in law, became a judge, then the chief commissioner of the treaty process, and now I am the 28th Lieutenant Governor of British Columbia. What I have come to realize is that racism exists in BC. I used to spend a lot of time trying to convince people that this was so. Lots of people compare Canada to the USA and conclude that in Canada there is no discrimination.

Well, our history is clearly different in Canada, but there is no doubt that racism and discrimination are alive and well in Canada. The big difference is that the overt type is largely controlled by our system of laws. We have the Charter of Rights, the Canadian Bill of Rights, we have international agreements, we have Human Rights Tribunals, and so on. We also have lots of covert discrimination. All that can be done is to raise awareness through conferences and through our education system in an effort to stop this form of behaviour.

There are problems that arise however. One is that sometimes racism is only in the eyes of the beholder. That is what I call the “burned hand” syndrome. If you touch a hot stove and get burned once, it is very likely that you will shy away from all forms of hot stoves later on in a bid to avoid the pain of possible injury. Sometimes those who get the brunt of racism get sensitive to the point of being bitter and angry. The other problem is that the threat of racism in the wrong hands, to gain an edge, can be a dangerous thing and result in more racism.

There is the problem of evolution. The belief that it is the strong who survive; it’s an attitude versus the religious belief that it is the meek who will inherit the earth. The there is the whole matter of the superiority complex versus the inferiority complex. This isn’t racism; it’s just intimidation, bullying whoever is in the way.

Sometimes I wonder about society and how it is changing. When the Europeans first arrived, aboriginal people were the majority. We traded with the Hudson Bay Company, sold them gold, salmon, everything. Later on, when the canneries were set up at the mouth of the river, the law was made to outlaw the sale of salmon by the Indians. That law exists to this very day. My question is this: Who does the law ultimately serve? Is it the people, or is it the ones who have power?

When the Europeans were then in the majority, they wouldn’t allow people of colour to come to Canada. The law was written to prevent Black, Indians from India, and Chinese people from immigrating to Canada. Today one quarter of British Columbia’s population has a mother tongue other than English or French. Now we hear from some political groups that there must be one law for all with no exceptions.

Who does the law serve and protect? Many of the Criminal Laws in Canada protect private property. Well, what if you don’t have private property? Does that law serve you, or does it become a tool of Colonialism that keeps the poor even poorer? These are some thoughts I have while sitting at my computer late at night, thinking about conferences like this one. So, thank you for listening.

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