Trust Issues: A Re-examination of Often Overlooked Foundational Concepts 2025

Course Chair
Alison Oxtoby — Fasken Martineau DuMoulin LLP, Vancouver

About the Course Chair
Alison Oxtoby is a partner at Fasken, where she works in the areas of trusts, wills & estates and tax-planned corporate reorganizations. She has been working in this area for over 25 years, and has had the opportunity to experience the practice from a variety of perspectives—at a large national firm in Vancouver, at a boutique firm in a smaller center, and in-house at a bank—enjoying the benefits and suffering the challenges of each, but always with a passion for the law.

Alison is a frequent presenter for a number or organizations, including CLEBC. She is also an active member of the legal community, having served as chair of the STEP Okanagan Chapter and an Executive Committee Member for the STEP Vancouver Branch, chair of the CBA's Okanagan Wills & Trusts Section, president of the Kelowna Estate Planning Society, and in various roles with the CBA BC Branch.

Faculty
Scott Boucher — Lawson Lundell LLP, Vancouver
Fiona Hunter — Horne Coupar LLP, Victoria
Scott Kerwin — Borden Ladner Gervais LLP, Vancouver
Amy A. Mortimore, KC — Clark Wilson LLP, Vancouver
David G. Thompson — Thorsteinssons LLP, Vancouver

Course Materials Contributor
Jonathan E. Fung — Clark Wilson LLP, Vancouver

Click here for full faculty bios

• key aspects of bare trusts
• distinguishing bare trusts from other arrangements
• challenging bare trust examples
• tax issues facing bare trusts

• what are they
• possible uses in BC

• the myth of a dual trustee legal personality in BC
• protecting trustees and trust assets from creditors
• concerns and consequences regarding breaches of trust

• what are powers and duties
• how may powers can be exercised
• types of powers (statutory and inherent)
• limiting the exercise of powers
• trustee exemption clauses and dealing with conflicts of interest

• using indefeasible vesting to
  • outwait a 75(2)/107(4.1) problem
  • provide a 20% interest to non-resident beneficiaries
• legislative framework
• CRA positions
• power of trustee to vest indefeasibly
• ramifications of vesting indefeasibly

• discretionary trusts and informed decision-making
• the joint-action rule of co-trusteeship, and uunanimous vs. majority decision-making
• delegating trustee duties
• powers of appointment held by trustees
• Toigo Estate decision and "momentous decisions"