Cheryl Milne

Background

Milne's professional formation took place in Ontario, the Canadian province whose largest city is Toronto. She studied law at the University of Western Ontario, receiving a Bachelor of Laws in 1985, and was called to the Ontario bar in 1987.

Her early career developed within Ontario's legal system, where the courts, the provincial bar, and the province's legal clinics handled a wide range of child welfare, education, family, and criminal matters. Her later work on children's rights and constitutional litigation grew out of this Ontario setting.

Education

Milne received her Bachelor of Laws from the University of Western Ontario in 1985. Founded in 1878 and now known as Western University, the institution is located in London, Ontario, and its law degree was the qualification that preceded her admission to the Ontario bar.

She later completed a Master of Social Work at the University of Toronto in 1991. Founded in 1827, the University of Toronto is one of Canada's largest public universities, and her combined legal and social work background later informed her role as director of the university's combined JD/MSW program.

Career

Milne was called to the Ontario bar in 1987. Her professional affiliation with Weir & Foulds, a Toronto law firm established in 1860, placed her in one of Canada's long-established firms, which has advised businesses, municipalities, and public bodies in Ontario.

She then spent seventeen years as a legal advocate for children at Justice for Children and Youth, a clinic that represents and advocates for the rights of young people in Ontario and conducts strategic litigation. There she represented young people in education, child welfare, family law, and youth criminal justice proceedings. She described her child-rights practice as beginning in the year Canada ratified the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child.

At the clinic she led Charter litigation under the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, adopted in 1982. This work included the challenge to the corporal punishment defence in the Criminal Code, pursued in Canadian Foundation for Children, Youth and the Law v. Canada (2004), and the challenge to reverse onus provisions of the Youth Criminal Justice Act in R. v. D.B. (2008). She also intervened in A.C. v. Manitoba Child and Family Services (2009), a case concerning a capable adolescent's right to consent to her own medical treatment.

In 2008 the David Asper Centre for Constitutional Rights was established at the University of Toronto's Faculty of Law, and Milne became its inaugural Executive Director. The centre is described as the only Canadian clinic that combines constitutional research, policy, teaching, and practice. Milne helped shape its mission and objectives, which emphasize constitutional advocacy, expert resources, and public awareness of constitutional rights. The centre's Constitutional Litigator-in-Residence program pairs students with leading practitioners.

Through the Asper Centre she has represented the organization at the Supreme Court of Canada, in cases including Attorney General of B.C. v. Council of Canadians with Disabilities, Attorney General of Ontario v. G., and Barton v. HMQ. As an adjunct professor at the Faculty of Law, she teaches a constitutional advocacy clinic and a course on children, youth, and the law. She has also taught Social Work and the Law at Ryerson University, now Toronto Metropolitan University.

Milne received the Ontario Law Society Medal in 2019 in recognition of her contributions to legal education and advocacy for children's rights. In 2025 she was named a recipient of the University of Toronto's Chancellor's Leadership Award in the distinguished leader category.

Achievements

• Led the Charter litigation of Justice for Children and Youth, including the challenge to the corporal punishment defence in the Criminal Code in Canadian Foundation for Children, Youth and the Law v. Canada (2004), a case that tested the constitutional equality rights of children.

• Served as the inaugural Executive Director of the David Asper Centre for Constitutional Rights, helping to develop its objectives of contributing to constitutional advocacy, serving as an expert resource, and increasing awareness of constitutional rights.

Views

Milne's advocacy is organized around access to justice and social justice. Her work has been guided by a commitment to access to constitutional rights, and she has been recognized for championing the human rights of marginalized groups, particularly children.

Membership

Milne has participated in several legal and child-rights organizations. The Canadian Bar Association is a national association of lawyers whose sections address specialized areas of law, including child and youth law and constitutional and human rights law. The Ontario Bar Association is a provincial association of Ontario lawyers that organizes practice-area sections. The National Association of Women and the Law promotes the equality of women through law and public policy.

Her child-rights involvement also includes the Canadian Coalition for the Rights of Children, a national network of organizations advocating for children's rights, and the board of Justice for Children and Youth, the clinic where she practised as an advocate. Her appointments to the Council of Canadian Academies' expert panel and to Ontario tribunals placed her in advisory and adjudicative bodies outside the university and the bar.

• Past Chair of the Constitutional, Civil Liberties and Human Rights Section

  Ontario Bar Association

• Past Chair; executive member

  Canadian Bar Association Child and Youth Law Section

• Executive member

  Canadian Bar Association National Constitutional and Human Rights Law Section

• Steering Committee member

  National Association of Women and the Law

• Chairperson

  Canadian Coalition for the Rights of Children

  2012

• Board member

  Justice for Children and Youth

  2014 - 2018

• Appointed member

  Council of Canadian Academies Expert Panel on Medical Assistance in Dying for Mature Minors

• Cross-appointed member

  Child and Family Services Review Board

• Cross-appointed member

  Human Rights Tribunal of Ontario

References

• Cheryl Milne, Faculty of Law profile, University of Toronto Faculty profile describing her call to the Ontario Bar in 1987, her Master of Social Work, her work at Justice for Children and Youth, and her roles as Executive Director of the Asper Centre and adjunct professor.
• Cheryl Milne's leadership of Asper Centre earns university recognition University of Toronto news article reporting her 2025 Chancellor's Leadership Award and describing her leadership of the David Asper Centre for Constitutional Rights since its inception in 2008.
  2025
• Cheryl Milne, Emond author biography Author biography describing her work as Executive Director of the David Asper Centre, her earlier child-advocacy practice, and her teaching at the University of Toronto.