Gail Davidson NCI Testimony

A learned discussion of the widespread, systemic violation of rights in Canada during the declared pandemic, specifically with respect to Canada's international human rights law obligations.

What happened, what should have happened, the right to remedy within liberal rule-of-law democracy, and what can be done now.

Gail Davidson has been a member of the Law Society of British Columbia since 1979 and is currently a retired member. For the past 25 years Gail has worked globally to enhance understanding of and compliance with international human rights and humanitarian law. Prior to engaging with international human rights advocacy and education, Gail practiced briefly as a criminal defense lawyer and then as a family law barrister.

Gail founded Lawyers' Rights Watch Canada (LRWC) in 2000, an NGO with UN Special Consultative Status that engages globally in international human rights law advocacy, research and education, was the Executive Director for 20 years. She and Professor Michael Mandel founded in 2001 and then co-managed Lawyers against the War (LAW), an international committee of jurists and others from 14 countries to oppose war, promote peace, advocate adherence to international humanitarian law and ensure accountability for violators.

Gail has written extensively about international human rights and humanitarian law. Communications authored, co-authored and edited include: amicus briefs to the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, the Inter-American Court of Human Rights and to domestic courts in Cambodia, Canada (including to the Supreme Court of Canada), Thailand, Turkiye and Viet Nam; reports, complaints and submissions to UN Human Rights Council, and its’ treaty monitoring bodies and Special Procedures; submissions to the UN Security Council; letters and briefs to governments around the world; books on rights to dissent, freedom from arbitrary detention, rights to legal aid, the right to know your rights, the criminalization of human rights defenders; and, briefs on other rights under attack.

As part of her work, Gail has organized and/or made presentations to, international law education events in Cameroon, Canada, Germany, Hong Kong, the Philippines, Switzerland and the United Kingdom. She has made several presentations to the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva. As part of LAW advocacy, Gail filed torture charges against George W. Bush in 2004 under the international jurisdiction provisions of the Criminal Code of Canada. LAW pursued the right of a private person or group to prosecute torture against a sitting president to the BC Court of Appeal and subsequently to the UN Committee against Torture.

In recognition of her human rights work Gail received the UBC Great Trekker Award (2003), the Indigenous Law Students Courage in Law Award (2013)[1] and was appointed as a Grace MacInnis Visiting Scholar by the Simon Fraser University Institute for the Humanities (2016).

Since retiring as Executive Director of LRWC in 2020, Gail has continued her involvement with international human rights law. She is a member of the Task Force of The Peoples’ Academy of International Law, hosted by the International Association of Democratic Lawyers. In 2021, she attended the Inquiry on Systemic Racist Police Violence against People of African Descent in the United States and contributed to the resulting book and the report to the UN Human Rights Council. Gail is a member of the Canadian Covid Care Alliance now called the Canadian Citizens’ Care Alliance. Gail continues to be a Director and member of LRWC.

[1] ILSA presented Gail Davidson with a ‘Courage in Law Award’ for her contributions to the: First Nations Rights: The Gap between Law and Practice series of free public education lectures, amicus brief to the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights in the case of The Hul’qumi’num Treaty Group vs Canada, Missing and Murdered Aboriginal Women and Girls in British Columbia and Canada report the UN Committee to Eliminate Racial Discrimination regarding the inequities of the Missing and Murdered Women Inquiry, and other work.