This province’s legal aid boycott entered its third month last week with a couple of hefty letters of support from two sources with some weight behind them.
The first was authored by retired Superior Court justice Hugh Locke who fears the “current imbalance in the criminal system will not only continue to have a negative impact on the administration of justice but may well be irreversible.”
The second came from the Ontario Crown Attorneys’ Association, representing nearly 900 prosecutors, stating it is their position that “the present funding of the legal aid tariff undermines the ability of the defence bar to perform their vital role.”
Locke, the first president of the Criminal Lawyers’ Association and current member of Toronto’s police services board, put pen to paper in late July.
Addressed to Frank Addario, president of the CLA which has spearheaded the boycott, Locke’s letter states that in his view one of the essential aspects to the administration of criminal justice “is an independent defence bar.
Because our criminal justice system is adversarial, a level playing field for all participants is essential, not only as a matter of fairness, but in order to maintain the rule of law.”
Locke said he has reviewed a number of reports on the issue and notes that there is a common theme.
“They detail years of neglect of the legal aid program while other participants in the criminal justice system have been allocated increasingly disproportionate resources.
While I do not wish to comment on why this has occurred and am more than cognizant of limited state resources, the situation in which the defence bar currently finds itself in is deeply troubling,” he said.
Locke believes that the independence of the bar may be in “peril,” and what he finds “particularly troubling” is the flight of senior lawyers from the bar and the judgment they bring to cases.
“Their absence, not only adversely impacts the individuals who are losing the benefit of their wise judgment, but also the court, Crown counsel, and the police.”
He said the lack of judgment has “tragic consequences” for the justice system.
Locke further noted that mentoring is “fundamental” to the administration of justice and the “continued flight of senior defence counsel whom at one time took on legal aid for the most serious of cases has resulted in a situation where mentoring, as the reports indicate, has steadily decreased to the point, I am told, that criminal defence articles are becoming rare or almost non-existent.”
The experienced judge said that is perhaps “the most troubling aspect of the situation because it has irreversible negative long-term effects on our criminal justice system. Without mentoring from senior members of the defence bar the independence of the judiciary is imperiled.”
Thomas Hewitt, OCAA president, wrote to express the association’s “concern regarding the current level of funding for Ontario’s legal aid program and to support the initiative by various parties in the legal profession to increase legal aid rates.”
Hewitt wrote it is “the position of the OCAA that the present level of funding of the legal aid tariff undermines the ability of the defence bar to perform their vital role . . . Our association is fully in support of a fair and properly funded legal aid system in Ontario and firmly hopes that the necessary changes are implemented at the earliest opportunity.”
It’s starting to look as if the province is the only one who thinks otherwise. Why?
This is my last week as Editor of Law Times
. Many thanks for being a great readership.- Gretchen Drummie
