Ethics and Commercial Law 2026

Course Chairs
Jon Festinger, KC — Whiteboard Law/Peter A. Allard School of Law, UBC, Vancouver
Valerie Mann, KC — Lawson Lundell LLP, Vancouver
Henry C. Wood, KC — Beach Avenue Barristers, Vancouver

About the Course Chairs
Jon Festinger, KC is a Vancouver based counsel and educator practicing. He is Of Counsel at Whiteboard Law. He has been an Adjunct Professor for over two decades at the Peter A. Allard School of Law, as well as teaching at various times at the UBC Graduate School of Journalism, the TRU Faculty of Law, and UVic Law. He is a Professor of Professional Practice at SFU and Faculty at the Centre for Digital Media and is also Honorary Industry Professor in the Centre for Commercial Law Studies, Queen Mary University of London.

Jon is a graduate of McGill University's Faculty of Law and in turn became a partner in the Vancouver firm of Owen Bird, general counsel of WIC (Western International Communications) Ltd., senior vice president of the CTV Television Network and executive vice president, Business & General Counsel of the Vancouver Canucks General Motors Place of the NHL. While at CTV, he helped launch VTV (Vancouver Television) and was the station's first general manager.

He is past chair of viaSport BC, vice-chair of the IBD Centre of BC as well as a member of the Law Society of BC's Rule of Law and Lawyer Independence Subcommittee.

Valerie Mann, KC is a partner in Lawson Lundell LLP's corporate group. She is the chair of the firm's Technology practice group which spans three offices: Vancouver, Kelowna and Calgary. Her practice is transactional (mergers and acquisitions/corporate finance) as well as advisory. After obtaining an honours bachelor of commerce degree, Val worked in marketing management with a large US based consumer packaged goods company, prior to obtaining her law degree. Val is the former managing partner of Lawson Lundell.

She has lead transactions for private and public companies including mergers and acquisitions, financings and corporate reorganizations as well as strategic alliances and joint ventures in the technology, manufacturing, resort, services, resource/commodities and energy sectors. Her practice includes acting for public and private companies as well as for private equity, venture and social impact fund sponsors in fund formation and acquisitions. She also advises Boards of Directors on governance matters.

Val is recognized by Lexpert® a Leading 500 Cross-Border lawyer, and leading practitioner in technology transactions, corporate commercial law and corporate mid-market law, Best Lawyers in Canada for technology, corporate law and mergers & acquisitions law, and was named Best Lawyers in Canada 2022 Lawyer of the Year (Corporate Law - Vancouver); and was recognized as a leading woman lawyer in Canada by Lexpert® (Zenith Award – 2013). Valerie was named one of Canada's Most Powerful Women: Top 100 by the Women's Executive Network in 2011, 2016, 2017 and was inducted into the Women's Executive Network Hall of Fame in 2018. She was the recipient of a Business in Vancouver Influential Women in Business Award in 2021, and was named one of the 500 Most Influential Leaders in BC in 2021, 2022 and 2023 as well as being recognized by BC Business Magazine as one of BC’s Most Influential Women in Business in 2015 and BC's Most Influential Women in Finance in 2019.

In addition to the practice of law, Val is dedicated to giving back to the community and has served on, and chaired, numerous boards and board committees in the not-for-profit sector. She is currently the chair of the Alzheimer Society of BC and Yukon and the vice chair of the BC SPCA.

Henry Wood, KC has practiced exclusively in civil litigation throughout his career. Over the past two decades, his emphasis has been increasingly upon administrative law—especially issues of professional regulation involving related investigations, disciplinary hearings, and appellate work.

He was an Adjunct Professor for nearly 20 years at the Peter A. Allard School of Law, UBC, where he taught courses in 'Professional Ethics and Responsibility' and 'Trial and Appellate Advocacy.'

His undergraduate studies were at Glendon College, Toronto, followed by law at Osgoode Hall Law School. He had extensive experience with criminal law early in his career, representing both the defense and the Crown, and was retained as a Special Prosecutor for the Federal government and the BC Attorney General in cases involving commercial crime. He has appeared as counsel before all levels of court in BC, the superior courts in Alberta and the Yukon, and the Supreme Court of Canada in addition to several administrative tribunals. He is frequently retained by lawyers as well as by the Law Society of BC concerning disciplinary matters and has been hired for discrete matters by the Yukon Government, the Law Society of Alberta, Law Society of Yukon, the City of Coquitlam, and the City of Vancouver. He was appointed Queen's Counsel in 2008.

Within the community, Henry has a longstanding interest in children's learning difficulties, having been a past chair of the Special Education Advisory Committee at Capilano University, founding president of a Chapter of the Learning Disabilities Association of BC in West Vancouver, and a former director of both the Laurel House Society and The Laurel Foundation for people on the autism spectrum.

Topics will cover:

• AI in litigation and court rules 
• real world use of AI in solicitors practice
• AI in the context of the Law Society and in a more theoretical sense