Access to Justice in Canada: The Unrepresented Accused and the Role of the Trial Judge

In Reference to the Court of Appeal of Quebec pertaining to the constitutional validity of the provisions of article 35 of the Code of Civil Procedure, 2019 QCCA 1492, the Quebec Court of Appeal recently indicated that “[a]ccess to justice is still one of the major challenges the Canadian judicial system faces” (at paragraph 185). Similarly, at the Official Opening of the Courts of Ontario for 2019-2020 Session, the Chief Justice of Ontario noted that “[o]n a daily basis throughout this province, judges discharge their obligation to assist unrepresented litigants. There are legal and practical limits on their ability to do so. I can tell you from personal experience, shared by every judge in this room, that the pace of a proceeding with an unrepresented litigant slows to a crawl and that every sector of the justice system bears increased costs as a result.”