Peggy J. Blair

Peggy J. Blair is the past Director of Legal Services and Senior Legal Counsel for the Canadian Medical Association. She has been a member of the Law Society of Upper Canada since 1990 and is a past member of the Law Society of Alberta (1982-1999). In 1993, Blair was the lead counsel in R. v. Jones and Nadjiwon, the first Canadian case to recognize Aboriginal and treaty rights to fish commercially in priority to other users. As a result of the backlash which followed, which included Aboriginal boats being set on fire, protest marches and a stabbing/swarming incident in Owen Sound, she attended Harvard University to train in Negotiation Skills (1993). A widely acclaimed expert in Aboriginal cross-cultural negotiations, Peggy was then involved in multi-party negotiations to resolve the volatile issues around the fisheries, which ultimately resulted in a precedent-setting and comprehensive co-management agreement between the First Nations, federal and provincial governments, involving all aspects of Great Lakes fisheries management (2001). She has offered a number of interest-based negotiations training courses to physicians through the Canadian Medical Association since early 2008. Blair worked for the Royal Commission on Aboriginal Peoples as a policy adviser on land claims and dispute resolution issues. She was appointed as a part-time member with the Canadian Human Rights Tribunal where she conducted hearings across Canada into allegations of discrimination (1993-1999) and she was the Chief Federal Negotiator in self-government negotiations involving 27 communities in northern Ontario (1997-1998). She has worked on a number of Indian Claims Commission reports as a legal analyst and writer since 1993. In 2003, Blair was selected by a multi-stakeholder panel as a Senior Adjudicator for the Indian Residential Schools claims dispute resolution (DR) process, hearing claims of serious sexual and physical abuse across Canada. Blair has a Masters in law (1998) and a doctorate in law (2003), both from the University of Ottawa. She was the first anglophone to be awarded the Prix d’excellence by the Association des professeurs de droit du Québec. She has published widely on Aboriginal issues concerning resource use and governance, on the rights of Aboriginal women and on Aboriginal culture. Her book, Lament for a First Nation, is highly critical of the Howard decision of the Supreme Court of Canada which removed the rights to hunt and fish of the seven Williams Treaties First Nations in Southern Ontario. It was published in May, 2008 by the University of Washington and UBC Press. Dr. Blair has been widely cited by well known Canadian scholars such as Dr. John Borrows, Douglas Harris, Kent MacNeil, and Mark Walters, as well as others for her legal analysis of Aboriginal hunting and fishing issues. In 2004, Dr. Blair was appointed as a Senior Research Fellow at the Centre for International Sustainable Development Law at McGill University, Montreal and was reappointed in 2007. She has been regularly named by Lexpert as one of Canada’s leading lawyers in her field since 1996. and is a regular speaker and commentator at conferences and in the media on Aboriginal issues and negotiations. In December 2004, Dr. Blair travelled to Ukraine as an election observer during the presidential elections as part of the Canada Corps. She has been a Deputy Chief Adjudicator in the Indian Residential Schools Settlement Agreement hearing process since October, 2007, and is currently listed in Canada's Who's Who as well as Lexpert.