A good first step at improving Family Law process in Ontario.
Ont. couples must now face mediation before divorce
The Canadian Press
Date: Sunday Jul. 17, 2011 10:45 AM ET
TORONTO — Starting Monday, every Ontario couple hoping to end their
marriage will have to attend an information session on alternatives to
going to court and must meet for mediation before getting a divorce.
The new rules will help alleviate some of the pressure on Ontario's
family court system and will save those hoping to get divorced time and
money, said Chris Bentley, the province's attorney general.
"Going to court and having a court battle in family proceedings can
be enormously costly, take a lot of time and probably most significantly
be very emotionally damaging to children and to the two individuals,"
he said.
Couples will have to attend the information session before they can file a divorce case in court.
If they still insist on going to court after that, they will first
have to attend a mediation session organized by the attorney general's
office to try settling their differences.
Despite the two-step process, some in the legal community think the initiative isn't as effective as it could be.
Judith Huddart, a family lawyer and president of the Ontario
Collaborative Law Federation, said the sessions don't advise those
considering divorce about their options early enough in the process.
"I know how frustrating it can be for people to be told that they
have other options after they've already hired a lawyer and started
forward in a litigation route," she said.
While Huddart supports making the program mandatory at all courts,
she said providing more information for couples when they are first
thinking about divorce would be an even more effective way to get the
cases out of provincial courtrooms.
The new program will only reach those who have begun the process of going to court, she said.
She estimated just getting to a first court hearing will often cost around $5,000 in lawyer's fees.
The province has been trying to fix that pricey problem by making
more information about alternatives to divorce proceedings available
online, said Bentley.
He added that he doesn't expect the new program will save his office or the courts any money.
The program is directed specifically towards saving time and legal
fees for couples hoping to get divorced, he said -- although he hasn't
been able to quantify those savings yet.
The attorney general's office will spend an extra $5.3 million a year
making the program mandatory at all courts, bringing the total cost of
the initiative to $8 million a year.
Those extra costs did not come from any additional funding from the
provincial government, Bentley said. His office was able to redirect
money from finding efficiencies in the other areas for which his office
is responsible.
http://www.ctv.ca/CTVNews/Canada/20110717/new-divorce-rules-ontario-110717/
