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Ottawa says lawyers don't deserve $80 million for First Nation child welfare settlement (www.cbc.ca)

submitted 2 years ago by grte to c/canadapolitics

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[–] TH1NKTHRICE 19 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago) (1 children)

The legal bill will not be paid out from the $23 billion in federal cash set aside for compensation. It also won't come from the other $20 billion earmarked by Ottawa for long-term reform of First Nations child and family services. Class action lawyers will be paid through additional public funds.

Their bill is $80 million dollars for a case taken on by multiple firms for over 10 years. It’s 0.19% of the total settlement amount, and doesn’t come out of the settlement money. Sounds fair to me.

[+] ultratiem -4 points 2 years ago* (last edited 9 months ago) (2 children)

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[–] cygnus 12 points 2 years ago (1 children)

that’s nearly $1 million ($800k) for the work, annually

How many people were working on it? $1M per year for a law firm's payroll doesn't go that far. It seems quite reasonable to me. If I were to criticize anyone, it's the feds.

[+] ultratiem -13 points 2 years ago* (last edited 9 months ago) (1 children)

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[–] Cagi 13 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago) (1 children)

This is the largest class action case in Canadian history with massive social, political, and legal consequences. Any multi billion dollar, national, class action case requires thousands and thousands of hours worth of work Teams of lawyers and paralegals reading and writing for 40+ hours a week for usually a couple of years. Giant firms will subcontract out to other giant firms just to help them get through all the paperwork in big class actions like this.

You not knowing this doesn't make it untrue, it just makes you wrong and mean. Don't guess how industries work if you have no experience in them. They are always more complex than you can sus out with your own musings.

[–] ImplyingImplications 7 points 2 years ago (1 children)

These law firms generated $23,000,000,000 in value for their client and are asking for $80,000,000 in compensation. That is a paltry amount of compensation compared to the value they generated. It's also in line with every other law firm which typically take 0.5% - 1% of the value they generate in cases over $1billion. If these law firms didn't get involved, their clients would be getting $0. Their work was worth it.

[+] ultratiem -8 points 2 years ago* (last edited 9 months ago) (1 children)

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[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 years ago (1 children)

What's your issue with lawyers? And the particular issue of them charging for specialized labour that got their clients BILLIONS in compensation.

[–] errorgap 5 points 2 years ago (1 children)

Everyone hates on lawyers, until they need one...

[–] baconisaveg 1 points 2 years ago

I'm sure people don't like seeing the giant payouts, but my understanding is the legal field is really unique in that regard. Taking on a client and spending thousands of hours on a job with the risk that you may not win the case, or that the judge may award a lot less than you're hoping for? I really can't think of any other industry that compares to that, except maybe something like R&D/Product Development.

Even with R&D though, your final product price is usually market controlled and you're gambling on units sold.

[–] FunderPants 4 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago) (1 children)

The Federal government has an obligation to negotiate or otherwise try to reduce this bill. It's public funds, and. I dont think they should just take the lawyers word for it in what they are able to bill.

[–] Splitdipless -1 points 2 years ago (1 children)

Don't want to pay a purchasing lawyers bill? Don't get sued.

[–] FunderPants 2 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago)

Sure, but this just isn't true. It's normal in Canada for a losing party to dispute the opposition councils bill on the grounds of hourly rates, disbursements and time spent. In some provinces the dispute is handled by a regulatory body, or you can go back to court to figure it out.

The dispute isn't about not paying, it's about ensuring that they pay a reasonable amount. And since the federal government is spending public money, they have the obligation to ensure the rate is reasonable and pursue disputes when they think it isn't reasonable.

If the federal government didn't act in this way, they'd be on the hook for unreasonable fees every time they lost a case.

[–] jadero 2 points 2 years ago

A few people are pretty cranky over the size of the bill. Here's my take.

The bill is $80 million for 10 years of work. We have lotteries that pay out that much a few times a year in a single drawing.

I don't know how many full-time equivalent staff-hours went into into it, but if someone wants to put together a law firm whose only job is to take the federal government to task over things like this, I'm happy to chip in $10/year. I'm sure we can find a million other people to do likewise.

All things considered, it sounds like a bargain. Considering the size of the judgement, I bet the plaintiffs wouldn't even blink had they been stuck with the bill. This just sounds like someone is a sore loser.