New minister of justice’s dedication to his community ‘unmatched’

While the outcome of the federal election remains to be seen, for now, the government is conducting business at least somewhat as usual.

As part of that, Prime Minister Mark Carney announced his cabinet a week ago and appointed Gary Anandasangaree as the new justice minister and attorney general, in addition to his existing portfolios of Crown-Indigenous Relations and Northern Affairs.

Sathiyasangaree "Gary" Anandasangaree was born in Sri Lanka to Veerasingham Anandasangaree, a former member of the Sri Lankan Parliament and leader of the Tamil United Liberation Front, and a vocal critic of violence committed on all sides in the country’s civil war. Anandasangaree travelled to Canada with his mother in 1983 and was largely estranged from his father throughout his life. He initially worked as a real estate broker before studying at Osgoode Law School. After his call to the bar in 2006, Anandasangaree opened his own firm in Scarborough, specializing in business, real estate and international human rights law.

Elected in 2015, Anandasangaree has served as parliamentary secretary to the ministers of Canadian Heritage and Multiculturalism, Crown-Indigenous Relations, and Justice. He was appointed to cabinet in 2023 as minister of Crown-Indigenous Relations, making him Canada’s first cabinet minister of Sri Lankan Tamil heritage.

In a statement, Canadian Bar Association President Lynne Vicars welcomed Anandasangaree’s appointment.

“We look forward to working with him and his cabinet colleagues,” she said.

“We also want to thank former minister Arif Virani for his commitment to improving the justice system over the past few years, including his efforts to reduce judicial vacancies and strengthen access to justice.”

Steeves Bujold, partner at McCarthy Tétrault LLP in Montreal and past president of the CBA, met Anandasangaree when he represented the minister of justice at the CBA’s presidential dinner — and was impressed by him.

“I would describe him as someone engaged, interested in the rule of law, the importance of the independence of the judiciary, and very keen in getting to know the members of the CBA and collaborating with us,” Bujold says.

Before politics, Anandasangaree served as counsel for the Canadian Tamil Congress, chair of the Canadian Tamil Youth Development Centre, president of the Canadian Tamils’ Chamber of Commerce, board member of the Youth Challenge Fund, member of the Toronto Police Chief’s Advisory Council, and member of the United Way Newcomers Grant Program. He was awarded the Queen Elizabeth II Golden Jubilee Medal and the Queen Elizabeth II Diamond Jubilee Medal for his work.

In 2014, Anandasangaree and his wife, Harini Sivalingam, a fellow Osgoode Hall graduate, created the N. Sivalingam Award in Tamil Studies with an endowed gift at York University.

“Minister Anandasangaree’s leadership and dedication to his community is unmatched,” Annie (Qurrat-ul-ain) Tayyab, president of the South Asian Bar Association, said in an email.

“He has gone above and beyond to be a fierce advocate for not only South Asian communities, but all those who need a strong voice to represent them both in and out of court, including at the United Nations.”

Tayyab says Anandasangaree, a consistent attendee at SABA’s annual gala, is always willing to lend a hand or provide guidance to those who need it.

“His passion for service to his community shines through in everything he does,” she says. “SABA is proud to see Minister Anandasangaree in this critical role, and we look forward to working with him on issues that matter to our members and the communities we serve.”

Devin Persaud, a partner at Miller Thompson LLP in Toronto and past president of SABA, grew up in Anandasangaree’s riding and says he was a well-regarded advocate and lawyer within the community.

“The Tamil diaspora looked to him for sage advice,” Persaud says.

The pair first met at the SABA gala in 2013, when Anandasangaree received the Young Practitioner Award and Persaud received the Student of the Year Award.

“Since then, we’ve connected. He’s been a staunch supporter of the Malvern Family Resource Centre, an organization I attended in my youth and often volunteered at, offering pro bono services.”

Persaud says that during his time as president of SABA, Anandasangaree was parliamentary secretary to the justice minister and a strong advocate of seeing representation in the profession.

He hopes Anandasangaree will continue to push the principles of equity and fairness in his new role and “send the elevator back down” to help uplift people who come from disadvantaged backgrounds as he did.

“He’s done a pretty admirable job in his last portfolio as the minister of Crown-Indigenous Relations,” Persaud says.

Prashanth Chandrapal, policy counsel at the Law Society of Ontario and president of the Tamil Bar Association, says Anandasangaree was instrumental in helping the TBA get started at a time when there weren’t a lot of mentors in the profession.

“In the early years, when Tamil lawyers were starting to get called, Gary, as a community leader, used to take out new calls for a celebratory dinner informally,” Chandrapal says.

“The TBA took that as a model, and now we have an annual Call to the Bar dinner where we take out everyone in the community who was called in a particular year. Gary has been attending for the past three years.”

Chandrapal says the new calls feel honoured, and it gives them an opportunity to talk about themselves, why they chose to go to law school, and what their plans are for the future. Having experienced lawyers attend creates a chance to network and provides mentorship opportunities.

“That’s something that we learned from Gary, and now, as a formal organization, we’re implementing it,” he says.

“Gary has always been our greatest support as a friend, a mentor, a colleague, and he goes out of his way to make sure that we’re succeeding.”

Given Anandasangaree’s experience in the Crown-Indigenous file, Chandrapal is hoping he can make more progress on the over-representation of Indigenous people in the criminal justice system.

Anandasangaree’s predecessor, Arif Virani, appointed more judges than any previous minister and reduced the backlog of vacancies to 19 across the country. That action followed a warning from Supreme Court of Canada Chief Justice Richard Wagner that the slow pace of appointments was causing court delays and impacting the administration of justice.

According to the minister’s office, throughout Virani’s mandate, 52 percent of judges appointed or elevated by the government were women (122 out of 234). As well, four percent were Indigenous (10 out of 234), 23 percent were racialized (53 out of 234), and five percent identified as members of the 2SLGBTQI+ communities (11 out of 234). In addition, 31 percent (73 out of 234) were functionally bilingual, and a further 13 percent (30 out of 234) could understand written materials even if they could not converse with counsel in both official languages.

Bujold says that while the work to clear the backlog of appointments was necessary, there’s still work for Anandasangaree to do, particularly around ensuring that new appointments are ready to fill vacancies as they happen.

“There are many months between the time someone is retiring and the appointment of the person who is going to replace them,” Bujold says.

“This is something that needs to be tightened. It’s possible to time the appointment of a good candidate within a few days or weeks of the retirement of another judge.”

The same applies to vacancies for chief and associate chief justices, given their importance in keeping the system running smoothly.

“The system at the Supreme Court of Canada works this way—when a judge announces his or her retirement, or their mandatory retirement date is known because it’s in the Constitution, the government sets up a committee pretty quickly to ensure that there’s no gap between the judge leaving and the person coming in,” Bujold says.

“It works there, so it’s possible to replicate that system at every level of appointment.”