New faculty members and Lam Chair

On July 1, 2019 UVic Law will welcome Robert Lapper, QC as the new David & Dorothy Lam Chair in Law and Public Policy, as well as two new faculty members: Alan Hanna and Dr. Irehobhude O. Iyioha. 

David & Dorothy Lam Chair in Law and Public Policy

Robert Lapper, QC is a senior public law lawyer with an extensive background in public policy,  professional regulation and governance, aboriginal law, and negotiations with First Nations. He is a graduate of the University of Victoria Faculty of Law (LLB '81), and has a Bachelor of Arts (Honours, Political Science,'78) also from the University of Victoria. After several years in private practice in Victoria, British Columbia, he joined the Government of the Province of British Columbia in 1994 as counsel to its then new treaty negotiation process, and was subsequently appointed Senior Counsel, Aboriginal Law. He was later appointed to senior executive positions in the British Columbia  Government, including  Assistant Deputy Attorney General – Legal Services, Deputy Minister of Intergovernmental Relations, Deputy Cabinet Secretary, and Deputy Minister of Labour, Citizens’ Services, and Open Government.

Robert moved to Toronto in 2012 and took up the position as Chief Executive Officer, Law Society of Upper Canada (now Law Society of Ontario), Canada’s largest regulator of legal professionals. He retired from that position, and returned to British Columbia in 2018. 

Robert is a member of the Canadian Bar Association’s National Policy Committee, and serves as Chair of Governance for the Yellowstone to Yukon Wilderness Preservation Initiative. He also serves as Canadian Chair of  the Commonwealth Lawyers’ Association, and as a Director of Lawyers’ Rights Watch Canada, where he is currently involved with advocacy at the United Nations to secure the release of Anglophone human rights advocates in Cameroon. This summer Robert will be teaching Legal Ethics and Professionalism.

New Faculty

Alan Hanna is a PhD Candidate at the Faculty of Law, University of Victoria, and an Associate Counsel at Woodward & Company Lawyers LLP in the practice of Aboriginal law. He holds a BA (Hons) and MA in Anthropology, and a JD from UVic. He is Blackfoot, French, and Scottish and is connected to the Northern Secwepemc community of T’exelc through marriage. Alan has taught courses at UVic in Aboriginal law, and Indigenous legal research methods. His practice and research interests include Indigenous laws and jurisdiction, governance, rights and title, and environmental sustainability under Indigenous legal traditions. Alan’s PhD work involves analysis of Tsilhqot’in traditional laws applied to the access and use of surface water to provide a framework for informing contemporary Tsilhqot’in watershed governance. In 2019-20, he will be teaching Legal Process, Transsystemic Contracts and Indigenous Lands, Rights and Governance.

Dr. Irehobhude O. Iyioha (‘Ireh Iyioha’) holds law degrees from the University of Benin (LL.B. with Highest Honours), the University of Toronto (LL.M.), and the University of British Columbia (Ph.D.). She has taught at the University of British Columbia, Western University, and the University of Alberta, and has held research and senior policy positions with the Governments of Ontario and Alberta. She is editor of two books: Women's Health and the Limits of Law: Domestic and International Perspectives (Routledge, 2019 – forthcoming) and Comparative Health Law and Policy: Critical Perspectives on Nigerian and Global Health Law (Ashgate, 2015) [with RN Nwabueze]. She has published in leading Canadian and international law journals, including Oxford University’s Statute Law Review, Canadian Journal of Law and Society (Cambridge University), University of Edinburgh’s African Journal of International and Comparative Law, and Osgoode Hall’s Transnational Human Rights Review. She is a past Nathanson Visiting Fellow at Osgoode Hall Law School and Visiting Scholar at the Faculty of Law, University of Toronto. Dr. Iyioha’s scholarship and service to community have been recognized nationally and internationally through numerous awards and honours, including the World Congress on Medical Law Award from the World Association for Medical Law, the 2016 Canadian Immigrant of Distinction Award for outstanding achievements in professional and service capacities, and the 2017 Canadian Association of Law Teachers Award (co-recipient) for a scholarly paper that makes a substantial contribution to legal literature. She was named to the Top 40 under 40 Class of 2018 by Avenue Magazine and in 2018 received the Stars of Alberta Award from the Lieutenant Governor of Alberta and the Minister of Culture and Tourism for exemplary leadership in service to others.  In 2019-20, she will be teaching Legal Process, Torts and Health Law.