Dugald Christie

Who was Dugald Christie?

Dugald Christie was a Canadian lawyer and political activist. He was based out of the city of Vancouver. He was the grandson of Dr Dugald Christie - a Scottish Presbyterian missionary doctor who founded the Mukden Medical College in Shenyang, China.

Christie began his political activities in 1991 when he began to offer free legal service to low-income people in Vancouver. As the head of the Western Canada Society to Access Justice he was instrumental in setting up numerous pro-bono clinics across western Canada. He charged extremely low fees, and his net income in the years 1991 to 1999 did not exceed $30,000 per year.

Christie is most noteworthy for a 2005 court challenge of a British Columbia law that extended provincial sales tax to legal services. Christie argued that the law unjustly infringed on the constitutionally-protected rights of low income people to access the justice system. He met with partial success at the Court of Appeal, but a further appeal at the Supreme Court of Canada overturned the lower court's decision on May 25, 2007.

In 2006 Christie began an effort to bicycle across Canada in order to raise awareness of the shortcomings of legal assistance programs in Canada. On July 31, 2006 in Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario, Christie was killed when he was hit by a van during his trip.