Former University of Saskatchewan law dean appointed to the Senate

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is turning to two provincial civil servants to fill Senate seats for New Brunswick and Saskatchewan.

Legal and constitutional expert Judith Keating fills a vacancy in the upper chamber for New Brunswick.

Keating is a 30-year veteran of New Brunswick’s public service and was the first woman to be that province’s deputy minister of justice.

Legal ethics expert Brent Cotter will fill a seat for Saskatchewan.

Cotter, a former deputy minister of intergovernmental and Indigenous affairs in Saskatchewan, was one of the first professors in the field of legal ethics in Canada. He helped lead the development and implementation of a nationally recognized, government-wide program of services for First Nations and Metis peoples.

He is also a former dean of the College of Law at the University of Saskatchewan.

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Cotter currently chairs the Government of Saskatchewan’s Public Complaints Commission.

He holds a bachelor of commerce in marketing from the University of Saskatchewan, as well as a bachelor of laws and a master of laws from Dalhousie University.

Trudeau has now named 52 independent senators since 2016.

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