[Updated 2013-11-09] The room for the conference has changed! The 2013 Professional Regulation Conference will be occurring in the West Meeting Room 205 & 207 at the Vancouver Convention Centre (1055 Canada Place, Vancouver, BC V6C 0C3).
[Updated 2013-10-07] Thank you for the great response. The 2013 Professional Regulation Conference is now sold out for live attendance.
If your organization sent in your registration form prior to or on October 4th , we will have seats for your attendance. If you sent in your registration form afterwards, we will be in contact with you and do everything we can to accommodate.
Conference description
The firms of Lovett & Westmacott and Ng Ariss Fong are holding their one-day 2013 Professional Regulation Conference at the Vancouver Convention Centre on Friday, November 15, 2013. The agenda is available here and the registration form is available here.
As the conference approaches, we will introduce each of the sessions.
CONFERENCE SESSION ONE
The first session will be an introduction to the concepts of fitness and character in the registration context. We’ll discuss the legal definitions and key cases, as well as where in the regulatory process fitness and character can become matters to be addressed.
We will also examine types of character and fitness issues, and the effects of the passage of time on those issues. For example, do some character issues have such a serous impact on professional duties or the reputation of the profession that no passage of time would be enough to infer an applicant has rehabilitated? Are there some competence issues that can never be brought up to standard over time? These are difficult questions for practically all regulators because of the mutable characteristics of people, and their ability to mature and learn.
We will also discuss hearings into character and fitness. Such hearings are relatively novel to many professional regulators, and for many, their enabling statutes and subordinate legislation are silent on investigative and hearing procedures at registration. What powers then do regulators have to investigate, control the procedures of a hearing, and to make orders? We will explore how regulators who hold character and fitness hearings deal with these issues, and talk about some options to consider when creating an investigation and hearing process.
Click here for an FAQ about the conference.
[Agenda updated 2013-09-10]