Government of Canada announces judicial appointments to the Tax Court of Canada

June 7, 2018 – Ottawa, Ontario – Department of Justice Canada  

The Honourable Jody Wilson-Raybould, Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada, today announced the following appointments under the new judicial application process announced on October 20, 2016. The new process emphasizes transparency, merit, and diversity, and will continue to ensure the appointment of jurists who meet the highest standards of excellence and integrity.

K.A. Siobhan Monaghan, a partner at KPMG Law LLP in Toronto, is appointed a judge of the Tax Court of Canada. She replaces Madam Justice J.M. Woods, who was appointed to the Federal Court of Appeal on June 16, 2016.

Susan Wong, Regional Director and General Counsel at the Department of Justice Canada in Vancouver, is appointed a judge of the Tax Court of Canada. She replaces Madam Justice V.A. Miller, who resigned effective June 1, 2017.

Biographies

Born in Sudbury, Ontario to parents who emigrated from Ireland, Justice K.A. Siobhan Monaghan holds a Bachelor of Commerce from Memorial University of Newfoundland and both an LL.B. (Gold Medalist) and LL.M. (Taxation) from Osgoode Hall Law School.

Following her articles in Calgary, Justice Monaghan was called to the Alberta Bar in 1985 and practised tax law as an associate with Bennett Jones LLP. She returned to Toronto in 1988 to join the tax group at Davies Ward Phillips & Vineberg LLP, where she practised for more than 25 years as both an associate and partner. In 2014, she joined KPMG Law LLP as senior partner, a position she held until her appointment.

Justice Monaghan has been extensively involved in the tax community, serving as a member of the CBA-CPA Canada (Canadian Bar Association-Chartered Professional Accountants Canada) Joint Committee on Taxation for nearly ten years, including two years as its co-chair. She is an adjunct member of the faculty of Osgoode Hall Law School’s Professional LL.M. program. She has also been a member of the Income Tax Education Committee of CPA Canada and has lectured at the CBA’s Tax Law for Lawyers program. As a Governor of the Canadian Tax Foundation, Justice Monaghan is a member of the committee that selects the recipient of the Douglas J. Sherbaniuk Distinguished Writing Award, an award she herself received in 1996. She has regularly spoken and written on tax matters, including as a co-author of Taxation of Corporate Reorganizations and as a contributing editor to Tax Policy in Canada.

Outside of her professional life, Justice Monaghan enjoys theatre, music, reading, and spending time with her friends and family, particularly her husband and three children and the family dog.

Excerpts from Justice Monaghan’s judicial application will be available shortly.

Justice Susan Wong was born in Drayton Valley, Alberta, and raised in Edmonton. She is the first Canadian-born child of Chinese immigrants who came to this country in the 1950s and 1960s. Justice Wong holds a Bachelor of Science degree in medical laboratory science from the University of Alberta. She worked as a hospital emergency laboratory technologist before earning her LL.B. from the University of Victoria in 1992. She articled at the Edmonton firm Corbett & Company and was called to the Alberta Bar in 1993 and the British Columbia Bar in 1995. She practised civil litigation and corporate/commercial law in the private sector in Edmonton and Vancouver before joining the Department of Justice Canada at the end of 1996.

At the Department of Justice, Justice Wong practised exclusively in the area of tax litigation from 1996 to 2008, when she became Regional Manager of the Tax Law Services Section in the B.C. Regional Office. She served on several national departmental committees in the areas of good practices, judicial review and employment insurance. She has appeared before the Tax Court of Canada, the Federal Court and the Federal Court of Appeal. In 2015, she was appointed General Counsel and Regional Director of the Business and Regulatory Law Section, a group of more than 70 counsel, paralegals and support staff responsible for general civil litigation on behalf of the Government of Canada in British Columbia.

Excerpts from Justice Wong’s judicial application are available.