How to Protect the Middle Class from Whopping Legal Bills, While justice grows unaffordable for many Canadians, Europe and Quebec offer a fix by Tasha Kheriddin, iPolitics, August 21, 2013, The Tyee.ca
What price, justice? In Canada, if you’re poor, you get legal aid. If you’re rich, you hire Clayton Ruby.
But for a growing number of middle class anadians, lawyers have become unaffordable. The result is that court cases that normally would take three days may take 10, as unrepresented litigants bog down the process. In other civil disputes, people simply may not exercise their rights at all — justice denied before it’s even pursued. According to a newly-released summary report by the Canadian Bar Association, Canada now ranks ninth out of 12 countries when it comes to access to justice. … Any new entitlement program which would benefit lawyers would be an almost impossible sell — and strange to contemplate when the profession is running ads trying to counter the public’s perception of lawyers as vulpine bottom feeders. [Emphasis added]
[In the January 18, 2013 and April 26, 2012 court hearings, the defendants’ lawyers demanded that I pay their costs even though my case is defending the public interest and Canadians’ access to safe, non-explosive, uncontaminated drinking and bathing water. ]
[Refer also to:
Report says access to justice in Canada ‘abysmal’
An Open Letter to the Honourable Neil Wittmann, Chief Justice
Fracking. The One Per Cent. Collapsing Canadian Courts. Jessica Ernst of Rosebud, Alberta
In Alberta And B.C.: Stephen Harper Destroying The Rule Of Law