 |
Ontario first implemented an organized legal aid plan in 1951.
Applications went to local committees, which assigned a lawyer to
eligible clients. Those lawyers provided legal assistance on a volunteer
basis. By 1963, the Ontario Government and the Law Society of Upper
Canada decided that the voluntary plan was not adequately meeting the
demand for legal aid and that it made excessive demands on the volunteer
lawyers.
The Birth of the Ontario Legal Aid Plan (OLAP)
In 1967, the Ontario Government introduced legislation to create the
Ontario Legal Aid Plan. The joint committee which recommended the
creation of a formal system of legal assistance extensively researched
the pros and cons of the basic American approach to legal aid, including
assigned counsel, voluntary defenders, public defenders and mixed
private and public systems, but in the end rejected all of them.
The Ontario system was eventually based on the legal aid plans operating
in England and Scotland. In these systems private lawyers represent
clients on legal aid certificates and are paid for their services on the
basis of fair compensation for their work. Ontario's approach remained
unique, in that it also included the provision of duty counsel lawyers
for unrepresented people in criminal courts. The Plan was to be financed
by the provincial government, while being administered on a day to day
basis by the Law Society of Upper Canada.
Providing equal access to justice for poor people has remained the
guiding principle for the Ontario Legal Aid Plan since the introduction
of that legislation more than 30 years ago.
While this system was seen to provide significant benefits to
financially needy persons it did not ensure legal service to all who
needed it. In fact, the Plan was considered to have serious "gaps" and
those gaps were described in the Grange Commission's Report on Clinical
Funding as follows:
"(a) The poor were not always aware of the assistance available under
the Plan, or even of their legal rights, and if they were, they were not
always willing to seek out that assistance and those rights.
(b) The coverage under the Plan was for reasons of economy and legal
efficiency limited to serious problems. But the problems of the poor,
though not serious in the traditional sense, have for them very serious
consequences indeed. For example, a tenant's dispute with his landlord
might involve very little in terms of dollars, but for him might be a
matter of survival.
(c) The problems of the poor too often by their very nature fall outside
the traditional skills of the private Bar and have come to be known as
Poverty Law. They include such matters as Unemployment Insurance,
Welfare, Pensions, Immigration, Workman's Compensation, where not only
advice but advocacy is sorely needed and vital.
(d) The private Bar and its clients know that it is sometimes not
sufficient merely to resolve the immediate problem. Often the client's
welfare dictates much more. He must know the dangers in order to avoid
them in the future and if they cannot be avoided, he may have to combine
with others to attack the root of the problem which perhaps can only be
done in the councils or legislatures of the land. Services such as these
are well within the field of the private Bar and if the aim of Legal Aid
as often stated is the rendering to the poor of the same legal benefits
as those available to their more fortunate brothers, some method needed
to be found to provide them.
(e) The coverage provided by a Legal Aid certificate is limited to
assistance in respect of a specific legal problem. But often the legal
problems of the poor are associated with and cannot be divorced from
their social, economic and personal concerns. What was needed was a
system which could take a more comprehensive approach to the problems of
the poor."
The Development of Legal Clinics in Ontario
Parkdale Legal Clinic in Toronto was established in 1971 in part to
address some of the shortcomings in the Legal Aid Certificate program.
Early in 1976 a body known as the Clinic Funding Committee was set up as
a Committee of the Law Society to administer legal clinics and at the
same time funds were made available for the establishment of seven new
clinics. By the beginning of the 1976-77 fiscal year a total of thirteen
clinics had been funded. By 1988 there were 44 legal clinics, and by
2001 there were over 70.
Legal aid today is available across Ontario, to lower-income people for
a variety of legal problems, including criminal matters, family
disputes, immigration and refugee hearings. Legal clinics address areas
of poverty law such as landlord/tenant disputes, social assistance,
debt, and employment issues.
Every Ontario resident and, in certain cases, non-residents requiring
legal assistance can apply. Eligibility is based on financial need and
the type of case. The applicant may pay nothing or a portion of the
costs of the legal aid, depending on their financial situation.
Until the 1980's, the major focus of the Ontario Legal Aid Plan (OLAP)
had been criminal law. Between 1980 and 1990, however, the Plan
considerably expanded its clinic, family, refugee, mental health, and
aboriginal services.
Services continued to expand in the 1990's. Indeed, in the early 1990's
OLAP was issuing more than 200,000 certificates a year for a broad range
of criminal, family, refugee, and other civil claims (including
certificates for mental health proceedings, administrative hearings and
a variety of property actions). Funding for the clinic system was frozen
in 1992, despite the fact that large areas of the province were still
without clinic law services.
The Crisis in Legal Aid
In 1994, the provincial government capped funding for the certificate
program. Over the next couple of years, certificate services dropped
significantly. In 1996-97, OLAP issued approximately 75,000
certificates, a reduction of more than 150,000 certificates from just a
few years earlier. The number of hours available on certificates was
also cut significantly, as were the number of OLAP staff.
In response to this crisis, the Ontario government appointed law
professor John McCamus to head a review of the Ontario Legal Aid Plan.
A
Blueprint for Publicly Funded Legal Services: the Report of the Ontario
Legal Aid Review, was released in September 1997. The advisory
committee recommended the
creation of an independent body to govern the Plan. It also recommended
experimentation with service delivery models such as the use of staff
lawyers, contracting and wider use of duty counsel, with more focus on
serving client needs.
Legal Clinics
Legal Aid Ontario - An Independent Agency
The Ontario government introduced legislation in late 1998 that creates
an independent agency called Legal Aid Ontario (LAO). The purpose of the
new corporation is to promote access to justice throughout Ontario for
low-income individuals. The Legal Aid Services Act, 1998, establishes
the following mandate for LAO:
• To promote access to justice throughout Ontario for low-income
individuals by
providing high quality legal aid services
• To encourage and facilitate flexibility
and innovation in the provision of legal aid
services
• To recognize the diverse legal needs of low-income individuals and
disadvantaged
communities
• To operate within a framework of accountability for the expenditure of
public funds
As part of its mandate under the Legal Aid Services Act, 1998, Legal Aid
Ontario is committed to identifying, assessing and recognizing the
diverse legal needs of low-income individuals and disadvantaged
communities. LAO provides legal aid services by any method it considers
appropriate, including certificates, staff offices, duty counsel,
community legal clinics, public legal education, summary assistance,
alternative dispute resolution and self-help materials.
Operating with guaranteed funding from the government, Legal Aid Ontario
(LAO) was finally able to begin expanding services moderately, beginning
in 1997 and 1998. In 1999, the new board of LAO held consultations with
various stakeholders of legal aid, and requested ideas and proposals on
how to improve or expand legal aid services and access to those
services. Stakeholders were asked to identify client needs that were not
currently being met and to recommend specific program initiatives that
would meet those needs.
Based on those consultations, the board approved 29 new and enhanced
service initiatives, which will improve access to legal assistance for
low income Ontarians. Each of these initiatives was developed and
implemented during 2000.
Legal Aid's Programs and Services
Legal Aid has a mixed delivery system - it offers clients a wide variety
of services, depending on the client's needs. Legal aid is available
through the certificate program, which entitles clients to receive
advice and representation by private lawyers or by Legal Aid staff
lawyers and through the community legal clinic program. Clients without
their own lawyer receive advice and limited representation from duty
counsel lawyers at the courts and the housing tribunal, and advice
lawyers are available in various community locations.
Legal Aid's Certificate Services
Legal Aid Offices in 48 communities receive and process client
applications and issue legal aid certificates to financially eligible
people. Legal aid certificates allow clients to receive legal services
from their choice of a private lawyer or from lawyers employed by Legal
Aid Ontario at family law offices and the refugee law office.
Certificates are available for a variety of legal problems, including
specific criminal, family, immigration and refugee matters, and some
civil law matters (for example, Workplace Safety and Insurance Appeal
Tribunal hearings and mental health law proceedings). The lawyer is then
reimbursed by legal aid according to a tariff fixed by government
regulation.
People with little or no income, or on social assistance usually qualify
for legal aid. The legal aid office looks at each person's financial
circumstances and the type of legal problem to decide on eligibility.
The financial test is based on both income and assets, and takes into
account monthly expenses. In some cases, the client may be asked to make
some financial contribution to the cost of their legal services.
Clients in Hastings and Prince Edward Counties have a legal aid office
in Belleville. The legal aid office in Napanee serves clients in Lennox
& Addington County.
Community Legal Clinics
Legal advice and representation is also available through 70+
independent community legal clinics to clients who have problems such as
housing, social assistance, pensions, workers' compensation, and
employment insurance. Clinic lawyers and community legal workers provide
representation, advice, public legal education and information and
advocate on behalf of disadvantaged communities.
In 2001, Legal Aid Ontario began expanding clinic service available in
Ontario to include some underserviced areas of the province. As part of
this expansion, the Community Advocacy & Legal Centre now provides legal services
in the previously unserviced areas of Bancroft and Trenton.
Each clinic is governed by its board of directors who are representative
of and responsive to the needs of the clients and their communities.
Some clinics arrange for duty counsel to provide assistance at
administrative tribunals. Services at individual clinics vary. The Board
of Directors may prioritize services depending on the location, local
resources and the needs of the community.
Community legal clinics include specialized legal services to groups
such as the disabled, elderly, injured workers, and native people. These
clinics include the
Advocacy
Centre for the Elderly,
Justice for Children and
Youth,
Advocacy Resource Centre for the Handicapped, Injured Workers'
Consultants, Industrial
Accident Victims Group of Ontario, the
Landlord's
Self-Help Centre, and
Aboriginal
Legal Services of Toronto.
Community Legal Education Ontario is devoted to the production of
public legal education materials for clinic client groups.
Read the pamphlet prepared by the
Association of Community Legal Clinics of Ontario (ACLCO):
What are Community Legal Clinics? ( PDF,
206 kb, 2 pgs)
Duty counsel
Duty counsel are lawyers assigned to courts to assist clients who do not
have a lawyer with them in the courtroom. In the criminal courts, duty
counsel advise clients of their right to plead guilty or not guilty,
help them apply for bail or to ask for an adjournment. Duty counsel also
represent clients at bail hearings, pleas of guilty and sentencing.
In family court, two duty counsel are regularly scheduled on motion or
other list days so that both sides of a family dispute can receive legal
advice and representation.
Duty counsel also accompany circuit courts in remote areas and attend
immigration hearings in Toronto and Mississauga. Legal Aid provides a
24-hour telephone advice service for persons in custody, and for young
offenders asking advice about alternative measures.
Legal Aid Ontario is exploring the idea of offering permanent duty
counsel for tenants at housing tribunals across the province. The
Community Advocacy & Legal Centre currently offers duty counsel at
hearings of the housing tribunal in Belleville.
Legal Aid Advice Lawyer
The Advice Lawyer is a service open to the public, operating between
three to four hours a week. The Advice Lawyer deals with family law
matters. Lawyers who are paid an hourly rate by legal aid provide
advice, assistance and review documents in over 83 communities of the
province. Clients may have to qualify financially before getting help,
but the service is free for people with no income or on social
assistance.
Currently, clients of the Community Advocacy & Legal Centre can access
an advice lawyer at the legal aid offices in Belleville and Napanee.
View Timeline Chart: History
of Legal Aid and the Clinic System in Ontario, 1967-2003
(PDF
format, 56 kb, 1 pg)
|
|
This site provides general information only,
specific to Ontario, Canada. It is
NOT legal advice. 
