Legal aid boycott ended

http://mobile.thestar.com/mobile/NEWS/article/755252

Katie Daubs
Staff Reporter


Ontario lawyers have ended an eight month boycott of the province's legal aid system —which has stalled more than 100 cases – with a seven year agreement.

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Legal aid lawyers – who currently top out at $96 dollars an hour – will see hourly rates rise five per cent annually, reaching $136 an hour by April 2015.

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In September, Attorney General Chris Bentley's announcement of $150 million in funding for Legal Aid Ontario over a four-year period was deemed insufficient by the CLA.

Sunday's deal saw the province agree to three additional years of rate increases for criminal, family, immigration and refugee and mental health lawyers who take on legal aid cases.

"It's not clear what the cost of those will be," Bentley said. "If there is additional cost for those tariff increases, the money would be found."

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Sunday's deal also creates a "big case" pay scale – to attract and keep experienced lawyers. Starting in February, lawyers working on the most complicated cases will make $120 an hour, and by April 2015, $160 an hour. The rate is based on a similar program in British Columbia.
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In an email to CLA members, president Paul Burstein wrote that the association had received recognition as the "voice of the legal aid defence bar."

"I congratulate and thank all of you for holding firm all these many months," he wrote.

James Morton, the past president of the Ontario Bar Association was glad the deal was structured along the same lines as the September announcement.

"The budgeting is already there and the money will actually flow," he said.
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