Stephanie White
Stephanie White practices labour and employment law as Counsel at the Department of Justice, Treasury Board Secretariat Legal Services Unit. In this capacity, she represents and advises federal government employers on a wide variety of labour and employment disputes including individual grievances pertaining to staffing and disciplinary issues, policy grievances, collective agreement interpretation, and discrimination claims under the Canada Human Rights Act. As part of her responsibilities, she also represents the government in related applications for judicial review before the Federal Court and the Federal Court of Appeal.
Prior to joining the Department of Justice, Ms. White maintained an active general litigation practice at McMillan LLP, and subsequently, at Warren Camacho LLP, with specializations in commercial litigation, product liability, employment law, and family law. She regularly provided strategic and substantive industry-specific legal advice to executives of local, national, and multinational corporations across a variety of sectors including product manufacturing, distribution, retail, insurance, construction, security, technology, food, health care, and telecommunications. She routinely engaged with companies to conduct corporate risk assessments and worked with them to pre-emptively revise policies and procedures to reduce the risk of litigation. In addition, she developed a specialized expertise in family law cases involving complex financial issues, constitutional challenges, and high conflict parenting situations and regularly represented clients in mediation and in court in this regard.
As a proponent of holistic lifelong learning, Ms. White has immersed herself in a variety of volunteer activities in support of her community. Most notably, over the last three years, she has been a Director on the Board of Directors and Co-Chair of the Governance Committee of the Youville Centre. In her role with Youville, she provides guidance on human resources, corporate governance, and general risk management to the Board and oversees all revisions to corporate by-laws and internal policies and procedures. She oversees the organization’s operating budget and participates in the provincial accreditation and strategic planning processes.
Ms. White has been an active mentor and wellness advocate formally in the firms where she has worked and informally in her social community. She has taken every opportunity to act as a mentor to junior colleagues to ensure that they have the necessary supports to succeed in a demanding professional environment. Informally, she strives to create an open and safe space for her family, friends and colleagues to speak about their challenges and access to the resources they require to thrive.
As a child of first-generation East Indian immigrants, growing up in a female-led single-parent household, Ms. White is committed to equity, diversity, and inclusion. She welcomes the opportunity to break down cultural barriers that continue to impede timely access to mental health supports in racialized and marginalized communities.
