Bilingual Legal Assistant

Bilingual Legal Assistant
FULL TIME, PERMANENT

Location: (Hybrid role – 2-3 days a week in office) – Toronto
Hours: Mon-Fri – 9am-5pm - (35 hours/wk.)
Salary:  Up to -$72K

Company:  Our client is a leading legal entity in Canada.  They are continually ranked as one of the best places to work in Canada.  Due to increased workload, they are looking to add a dynamic individual to their talented team of professionals.

Perks:

•   Full benefits package including:  Health, Dental & Vision (starting after 3 months)
•   15 paid vacation days
•   8 paid sick days
•   3 personal days
•   Pension
•   Access to continuous improvement initiatives
•   On-site French classes
•   Lunch and learn sessions
•   Social committees
•   Company special events
•   Company charitable events
•   On site cafeteria
•  Waffle Thursdays

Job Summary:

The Bilingual Legal Assistant is responsible for providing confidential and complex legal administrative support to the Director, Assistant Manager and Discipline Prosecutors in Litigation Services. This includes providing para-professional, organizational and technical support. The Bilingual Legal Assistant is responsible for planning, organizing and coordinating practices and procedures support, ensuring ongoing case management while handling multiple and competing deadlines relating to internal complaint processes, regulatory and/or court proceedings. The Bilingual Legal Assistant is responsible for preparing, and sometimes drafting, documentation for the hearing process (in both Tribunal and court settings) in both French and English. The Bilingual Legal Assistant attends to all professional regulation activities equally effectively in French and English. The Bilingual Legal Assistant works independently as well as under a combination of general supervision and/or guidance.

Duties:

Client / Customer Service Delivery

• Must ensure that procedural, legal and administrative requirements are met with respect to applications before the Tribunal and/courts.
•  Duties and responsibilities include opening files, typing, drafting, proofreading, photocopying, faxing, binding documents, scanning, screening and distributing mail, revising and formatting various correspondence and legal documents, issuing and arranging for service of originating processes and other documents in accordance with the company’s Rules of Practice and Procedure and the Rules of Civil Procedure, liaising with witnesses, closing files and preparing materials for storage.
• Maintaining, sharing and organizing complex, confidential/sensitive/privileged and potentially high profile information.
• Interacting with company staff, licensees, applicants and the public regarding sensitive/privileged and potentially high profile matters.
• Provides discernment and decision-making based on experience gained while working in the legal field to determine appropriate responses to inquiries and follows up on same ensuring customer service standards are maintained.
• Preparing and filing materials with the Tribunal Office and the Courts in respect of hearings, motions and appeals in accordance with the company’s Rules of Practice and Procedure and the Rules of Civil Procedure, with associated deadlines.
• Assisting discipline prosecutors in the preparation and coordination of hearings.
• Regularly drafting or preparing affidavits, charts, correspondence and memoranda.
• Regularly preparing and organizing books of authorities, document books, facta, materials to be filed as exhibits in hearings and hearing briefs for discipline prosecutor’s review.
• Assisting discipline prosecutors with witness interviews including taking notes, collecting documentation and potentially becoming a witness in regulatory proceedings.
• Conducting moderately complex reviews of investigation documents to prepare disclosure (organizing, vetting and tagging documents); identify privileged and/or irrelevant for discipline prosecutor’s review.
• Redacting documents for filing at hearings to eliminate/protect confidential or identifying information.
• Coordinating and requesting the services of process servers to serve materials on licensees, applicants and witnesses.
• Drafting, swearing/affirming their own affidavit as required in relation to personal in-depth knowledge of litigation files. May be required to testify at regulatory proceedings in which a licensee’s right to practice may be affected, including being subject to cross-examination by defense counsel.
• Preparing summonses to witnesses and contacting witnesses regarding their availability and coordinating travel arrangements and/or virtual hearing appearances.
• Ensuring the accurate and timely maintenance of the case management requirements of the Litigation Services processes.
• Uploading various Tribunal and Court documents to the Discipline History Database.
• Preparing summary sheets outlining details of regulatory proceedings and appeals.
• Maintaining electronic and paper files in accordance with established protocols.
• Scheduling appointments and meetings, ensuring room set up, required documents, and availability of attendees, and arranging for language interpreters as required.
• Assisting the Administrative Manager and assigned team by reviewing reports to ensure the case management system is accurate and up to date.
• Calendaring all case related deadlines for discipline prosecutors.
• Monitoring deadlines and due dates for case preparation.
• Coordinating travel arrangements as requested for staff.
• Ordering transcripts from court reporters who transcribed company proceedings and from various court offices.
• Calling or attending court offices to obtain documents or information concerning ongoing investigations, regulatory proceedings and/or appeals from regulatory proceedings, as required.
• Answering inquiries from company staff, witnesses, complainants, licensees, and applicants and following up on same ensuring excellent customer service standards are maintained.

Financial Responsibility 

• Maintains office supplies for assigned work area and orders supplies as required.
• Ensures the efficient operation of all office equipment.
• Prepares expense reports, cheque requisitions and processes invoices as received for payment.
• Compiles statistics and special reports as assigned.  

• Fluently bilingual – English/French – Spoken and Written.
• Law Clerk diploma or Paralegal.
• 3-5 years’ para-professional experience as a law clerk or legal assistant in a law practice, government and/or regulatory environment.
• Litigation experience is mandatory.
• Knowledge of law office, court and/or tribunal practice and procedure is essential.
• A solid knowledge of legal office practice, legal terminology (French and English) and procedure relating to legal correspondence and legal documents and the Rules of Civil Procedure and/or Rules of Practice for an Administrative Tribunal.
• Solid experience and skill in drafting legal documents (affidavits, legal correspondence, etc.) in French and English.
•  Ability to locate legal cases on CanLII as requested by discipline prosecutors and under their direction.
• A strong proficiency in a wide range of computer applications, including, but not limited to MS Office applications, Outlook, Word and Excel database applications, case management systems, Internet and intranet and other software applications (Adobe Acrobat DC, ShareFile, SharePoint).