legislative counsel for the federal govt

[multilingualcat]

Hi, is anyone here a legislative counsel for the federal govt? What's your day-to-day like? What skills would you say are required to be a good legislative counsel besides bilingualism? 

[TheDevilIKnow]

That's a very specific job and I don't recall anyone here posting about it. However, it sounds like @Mal has played a somewhat similar role within finance, and could maybe chip in?

On a related note, it is interesting at the apparent diversity of legal jobs with the federal government. I'm familiar with one application process and set of roles (from applying to a regional office which mostly does litigation); the range of jobs in Ottawa seems much bigger and more diverse.

[Wolfe]

12 hours ago, multilingualcat said:

Hi, is anyone here a legislative counsel for the federal govt? What's your day-to-day like? What skills would you say are required to be a good legislative counsel besides bilingualism? 

There's maybe 20 people in the country who have this job. I don't know of any on the forum. Suggest crawling Linkedin or GEDS. Most legislative drafters work for the Department of Justice directly, but a few will be working at the Department of Finance and the Privy Council. 

[PzabbytheLawyer]

You'd be living in Ottawa. Choose carefully.

[Chewy]

26 minutes ago, PzabbytheLawyer said:

You'd be living in Ottawa. Choose carefully.

[BlackRod]

You can reach out to Professor John Mark Keyes at the University of Ottawa. Even if you don't go to the school, I am sure he would be happy to chat with students about legislative drafting positions with the feds.

I would note that at the federal level, government/ministry bills are drafted by counsel working for the executive (generally, the DOJ). But private members' bills are drafted by counsel employed directly by the legislative chambers: i.e., both the House of Commons and the Senate.

As a poster indicated above, these positions are few and far between. If you are interested in legislative drafting roles, you would likely want to cast a wider net, and apply to the governments (or legislative chambers) in the provinces and territories.

Edited January 7, 2023 by BlackRod

[multilingualcat]

15 hours ago, BlackRod said:

You can reach out to Professor John Mark Keyes at the University of Ottawa. Even if you don't go to the school, I am sure he would be happy to chat with students about legislative drafting positions with the feds.

I would note that at the federal level, government/ministry bills are drafted by counsel working for the executive (generally, the DOJ). But private members' bills are drafted by counsel employed directly by the legislative chambers: i.e., both the House of Commons and the Senate.

As a poster indicated above, these positions are few and far between. If you are interested in legislative drafting roles, you would likely want to cast a wider net, and apply to the governments (or legislative chambers) in the provinces and territories.

Thanks, I am going to reach out to him. Would you say that landing a legislative position is competitive? No one I've met in law school is interested in that. 

[BlackRod]

On 1/7/2023 at 3:09 PM, multilingualcat said:

Thanks, I am going to reach out to him. Would you say that landing a legislative position is competitive? No one I've met in law school is interested in that. 

Sorry for the delay.

Hard to say re. competitiveness. It is a unique breed of lawyer who wants to work exclusively in the area of legislative drafting. But: (i) there aren't very many jobs in the legislative drafting drafting office of the DOJ; and (ii) all counsel positions with the DOJ are fairly competitive.

If it's an area that you are interested in, I would reiterate that you should keep your eyes open on other governments/legislatures around the country (unless you must stay in the NCR for personal reasons).

[Major_Agnostic]

On 1/3/2023 at 9:36 PM, multilingualcat said:

Hi, is anyone here a legislative counsel for the federal govt? What's your day-to-day like? What skills would you say are required to be a good legislative counsel besides bilingualism? 

Hi, I'm a year late to this, but I'm about to accept an LP-01 position (I'm currently articling with DOJ through the LEP program) as a drafter (regulations specifically). I imagine that I cannot answer many questions at this time, but I may revisit this thread later once I've actually got some experience under my belt. Meanwhile, take a look at this Reddit post (specifically, the first large comment, as the main post has been deleted), which is quite accurate and informative, based on the little I've learned so far at Justice: 

 

Edited Friday at 06:15 PM by Major_Agnostic
Fixing link