Index of the 16 Blog Posts about the Report “Access to Justice in French”

In August 2012, the Ministry of the Attorney General published the French Language Services Bench and Bar Advisory Committee’s report entitled Access to Justice in French.

Access to justice in French is crucial for Francophone communities across Ontario hence I took the initiative to publicly present my analysis of the report in a series of 16 blog posts and two news releases. Of course, I also referred to this important question in my 2012-2013 Annual Report.

In order to facilitate navigation through these resources, please find below the blog posts in chronological order by publishing date:

1. The Bench and Bar Advisory Committee on French Language Services Publishes its Report on Access to Justice in French in Ontario (posted on August 2, 2012);
2. Finally, a Real Action Plan for the Access to Justice in French in Ontario! (posted on August 3, 2012, and accompanied by a news release);
3. The Importance of Access to Justice in French (September 12, 2012);
4. What our Complainants Have to Say about Access to Justice in French (September 13, 2012);
5. Joint News Release with the Ministry of the Attorney General of Ontario (posted on November 20, 2012, and accompanied by a news release);
6. Behind the Scenes of Access to Justice in French (November 21, 2012);
7. A Clear Service Objective and Active Offer: The Prerequisites for Equal Access to Justice in French (November 29, 2012);
8. Good Language Rights Education for the Judiciary Means Better Access to Justice in French (December 7, 2012);
9. Let’s Be Clear; Let’s Be Fair (December 14, 2012);
10. What Price Justice for Francophone Litigants? (December 19, 2012);
11. Toward a “Franco-Sensitive” Way of Administering the Provincial Offences Act (January 7, 2013);
12. Language Skills and the Allocation of Bilingual Judicial Officers in Ontario (January 25, 2013);
13. Coordinating Bilingual Court Staff and Educating Court Employees about French-Language Rights (March 8, 2013);
14. Many Solutions for Better Coordination of French-Language Proceedings (April 5, 2013);
15. Access to the Legal Profession, the Key to Access to Justice (April 11, 2013); and
16. Justice in French in Ontario: A Promising Future (May 21, 2013).

Also, I published two blog posts about the study Access to Justice in both Official Languages: Improving the Bilingual Capacity of the Superior Court Judiciary led by the Commissioner of Official Languages of Canada in partnership with the Commissioner of Official Languages for New Brunswick and myself. The first of them, entitled Access to justice in both official languages, was posted on May 17, 2012; and the second, entitled The Joint Study on the Bilingual Capacity of Canada’s Superior Courts is Released by the Three Commissioners, was posted on August 16, 2013, and accompanied by a news release and highlights of the study.

I am delighted to be able to count on the Attorney General’s leadership in implementing the action plans outlined in both reports. I am hopeful that the eventual outcome of the new solutions will be that Francophones will no longer have to experience barriers to accessing justice in French that prevent the legitimate exercise of French language rights in Ontario’s courts.