The Legal Excellence Program – Saskatoon

Articling Opportunities Across Canada

Articling Opportunities Across Canada

Prairie Region - Saskatoon Office

On behalf of the Attorney General of Canada, we represent the federal government in litigation matters affecting departments and agencies, before all levels of superior court, and before a number of administrative tribunals. We are also engaged in challenging and interesting solicitors’ work, in areas of corporate, commercial, economic development, real property, regulatory compliance, tax, and aboriginal law.

The Saskatoon Office of Justice Canada is part of the Prairie Region, and its members work collaboratively with other regional colleagues in Edmonton, Calgary and Winnipeg. Students will work on files within all practice areas during their articles and are valued members of our team.

The Saskatoon Office has approximately 98 employees working in a supportive local environment in conjunction with Justice Canada counsel and client department officials located across the country. Our practice areas include:

Aboriginal Law

We provide legal resolution and litigation services to Crown Indigenous Relations and Northern Affairs and Indigenous Services Canada. This practice area involves work on complex and highly significant litigation involving constitutional law, Aboriginal law, administrative law, property law, and public law before the Federal Court, Federal Court of Appeal, provincial superior courts, and the Specific Claims Tribunal.

Advisory

We provide legal advisory services and support to Crown Indigenous Relations and Northern Affairs and Indigenous Services Canada in fulfilling their legal obligations to First Nations in the Region by recognizing and respecting First Nations’ desires to become more self-sufficient and self-governing while balancing the public interest. The Aboriginal advisory practice combines traditional areas of property and commercial law, contract, torts, environmental law, estates law, constitutional law, employment law, and information and privacy law with the dynamic and ever-evolving area of Aboriginal law. Solicitors in this practice area have broad expertise in facilitating such things as on-reserve economic development for gas stations, casinos, office buildings, resource extraction and more. Our advisory services also support initiatives bringing selected Treaty Land Entitlement land into reserve, creation of urban reserves and supporting First Nations’ self-governance initiatives.

We also provide legal advisory services to other federal departments such as Agriculture and Agri-food Canada, National Defence, Parks Canada, Transport Canada, and Western Economic Diversification.

Regulatory Law and Public Safety

We provide litigation services to a wide range of federal government departments and agencies, representing the Attorney General of Canada in areas of practice that include human rights, administrative, environmental, energy, access to information and constitutional law. Client departments include Environment and Climate Change Canada, Canadian Food Inspection Agency, Agriculture and Agri-food Canada, Health Canada, Transport Canada, Royal Canadian Mounted Police, Correctional Service of Canada, and Canada Border Services Agency. Counsel also carry conduct of Immigration and Refugee Protection Act, Firearms Act, and Extradition Act proceedings.

Tax Law

We provide litigation and advisory services to the Minister of National Revenue (MNR), and represent the Crown in tax-related civil proceedings in provincial and federal courts. Our Region is recognized for its in-depth expertise in resource taxation matters and much of the oil and gas work in the country is handled by the Prairie Region. We provide legal services with respect to the collection of debts owing to the MNR and represent the federal Crown’s interest in bankruptcy and insolvency proceedings in the superior courts of the provinces.

External Placements

As part of articles in the Saskatoon Office, we typically arrange for external placements that expose our students to areas of practice not conducted within Justice Canada.

Public Prosecution Service of Canada

Students who article with the Department of Justice will also have a rotation with the Public Prosecution of Canada. Counsel with the PPSC are responsible for:

For more information about the Public Prosecution Service of Canada, please visit its website.

Private Practice Placement

We traditionally partner with local private practice law firms for a one month placement of our students, where they are exposed to work unique to the private bar.

Placement with the Court

In recent years we have been able to arrange a one month placement of our students with the Court of King’s Bench or the Provincial Court, providing our students with an opportunity to learn more about the operations and procedures of the court, which will enrich their understanding as they continue their articles and ultimately become members of the bar.

Salary and benefits

For the 2023-2024 year, articling students are entitled to:

General Articling Information

The Saskatoon office provides an exceptional articling experience focused on legal excellence. During the course of the year, students in Saskatoon will rotate through:

Our students have traditionally been afforded the opportunity to participate in an exchange program with the Court of King’s Bench or the Provincial Court for four weeks and with a private firm for four weeks.

One lawyer is assigned as the student’s principal throughout their articles and a supervising counsel monitors the student’s work and provides a written evaluation at the end of each rotation.

Articling student appointments will be made under the Justice Canada LP-01 Training and Development Program. This program provides for the progression of participants from LP-00 (articling student) to LP-02 (counsel) over approximately 5 years. As such, it is expected that an initial appointment to this program would ultimately result in an indeterminate non-advertised LP-02 appointment (subject to meeting all program requirements).

The Application Process

We will participate, with other Saskatoon law firms, in the Articling Student Recruitment process according to the guidelines produced by the University of Saskatchewan College of Law.

This posting is open to persons residing in Canada and Canadian citizens residing abroad.

Applications must include the following documents:

Applications that do not include all of the above items will be considered incomplete. Incomplete or late applications will not be considered.

As a condition of employment you will be required to obtain secret security status.

The interview process will consist of a written exercise, followed by an oral evaluation.

All applications should be submitted by the following method:

The Department of Justice believes that to be able to effectively serve the public, its workforce needs to reflect the diversity of the Canadian population. Diversity is a great source of strength in driving Canada’s Legal Team in ensuring that Canada’s justice system is as fair, accessible and efficient as possible. The Department is committed to a representative workforce that represents the Canadian public we serve. If you are an Indigenous person, a woman, a person with a disability, a member of a racialized group* or a member of the 2SLGBTQI+**/Sexual Orientation, Gender Identity and Expression (SOGIE) community we encourage you to self-declare in this staffing process.

* Please note that this group is currently designated as members of visible minorities in the Employment Equity Act and the self-declaration form.

** 2SLGBTQI+: Two-Spirit, lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, intersex, and people who identify as being part of sexual and gender diverse communities.

Students who wish to have their employment equity status considered at the time of articling interviews should self-identify in their applications.

Applicants must demonstrate in their application that they meet the following qualifications in the Statement of merit criteria and conditions of employment.

We thank all those who apply. Only those selected for further consideration will be contacted.

Contact Information

For more information about the articling program in the Saskatoon office, please contact:

Melissa Nicolls
Chair, Articling Student Committee
Telephone: (306) 518-0742
E-mail: melissa.nicolls@justice.gc.ca

Daryl Schatz
Regional Director
Telephone: (306) 518-0701
E-mail: daryl.schatz@justice.gc.ca