Statistics Canada Report on Legal Aid

The Canadian Centre for Justice Statistics (part of Statistics Canada) today released its annual overview of legal aid services entitled Legal Aid in Canada: Resource and Caseload Statistics 2005/2006.

Last year, legal aid services surveyed spent close to $673 million.

The survey reports that:

"In most jurisdictions, the majority of legal aid applications were for criminal matters. This includes more than 70% of applications in New Brunswick, Saskatchewan, Alberta and Yukon. In contrast, the majority of applications
in Ontario (75%) and Quebec (55%) were for civil matters. Given that these two provinces account for the majority of applications, overall we see that more than half (59%) of legal aid applications were for civil matters in 2005/2006".

The survey is divided into sections on the organization of legal aid services, sources of revenues, expenditures, an overview of applications for assistance, and the participation of lawyers in the provision of legal aid.