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ARTICLE · 03 DECEMBER 2021

High Time For Shorter Trials

Lenczner Slaght
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The bench and bar have long recognized that lengthy trials decrease access to justice.

CanadaLitigation, Mediation & Arbitration
David Salter
David Salter
Sam Hargreaves
Sam Hargreaves
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The bench and bar have long recognized that lengthy trials decrease access to justice. That is no surprise: trials are expensive, long trials more so, and lawyers generally think that the longer the trial, the longer it takes to receive a decision.

The Supreme Court has said that "protracted trials" can cause Canadians "to give up on justice," and Justice Osborne's Report on Civil Justice Reform recommends that pre-trial judges "be vested with the authority to impose time limits" on trials. But time-limited trials are controversial. Critics assert that time-limited trials trade efficiency for accuracy.

Something critical is missing in this debate: data. Even rudimentary information regarding the number and length of trials and reserve periods (the time between the end of a trial and a decision) is largely unavailable, let alone data regarding how the length of trials or reserve periods affects access to justice. We do not know how many trials occur in Canada

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