Nunavut's new chief justice on her job, and what Nunavummiut can expect from her bench

Longtime northern lawyer and Nunavut judge Susan Cooper was acting as Nunavut's chief justice for several months before she officially took on the role. 

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announced Cooper's appointment in a news release last Friday. 

The territory's outgoing Chief Justice Neil Sharkey retired because he turned 75 — the mandatory retirement age for judges. 

Cooper was appointed to the Nunavut bench in 2009. Before that, she was an associate at Cooper and Johnson, a firm in Yellowknife, from 1988 to 1992. 

She then practised as a sole practitioner in Yellowknife and Iqaluit and became a partner with Chandler and Cooper in 1998. 

Cooper spoke to the CBC's TJ Dhir about her new role and what she hopes to accomplish.

This interview has been edited for clarity and length. 

First off, what does the chief justice do?

Well, the chief justice does the same job as the other judges do. You still go to court to hear cases. You made decisions, but you're in charge of the administration of the court and providing some leadership hopefully, too. 

Neil Sharkey was the former chief justice. What was he like as a mentor and as a chief justice?  What do you think his legacy will be?

Well, of course, Neil's legacy as a mentor goes back long before his role as chief justice. He was a great mentor to me and I know to many other young lawyers back in the late '80s and '90s when he ran the local legal aid clinic. And so that role very much continued into his role as chief justice of the court.

You've been a lawyer and a judge in the North for a long time. Was there always this succession plan, that it was going to be you who would be replacing him in the end? 

I don't think so, at all. There are many experienced, good judges on our bench and certainly any one of them would have been good in the position. So I don't think that by any means it was assumed that I would be the next one.

What was your reaction when you heard that you were going to be the new permanent chief justice?

Well, it's a great privilege to be able to serve the territory in this role. And then you start to think about the responsibility that comes with it, because of course, the position is not about any individual, it's about the institution, and the responsibility is to protect the integrity of the institution.

What goals or priorities do you have for the Nunavut Court of Justice, going forward in your tenure?

I think my priorities are capacity building and community engagement. So one of my very big priorities is the justice of the peace program, expanding on that, and in particular the recruitment and training of community justices of the peace in all three regions. I'm also a big supporter of the interpreter program at Nunavut Arctic College, so we're working on some initiatives with them to try and get some of their students interested in working for the courts. 

Lawyer training is something I've been involved in as a lawyer through organizing and instructing at the intensive trial advocacy course. So I look forward to working with the law society and other stakeholders in lawyer retention so that we can have more of our legal services delivered by people who live here. And I'd also like to look at reinstating and revitalizing the elders program.

So what can Nunavummiut expect now that you're chief justice?

Well, I hope we carry on the good work of the previous chief justices who came before me. And as I say, if we can revitalize the community justice of the peace program the way I would like to, then I'm hoping that people will see more of these types of decisions made in their communities and in their regions.

I look forward to the work very much. I have very supportive colleagues around me and we have wonderful staff at the court and certainly none of my colleagues on the bench or myself could do our work without the great staff we have.