Access to Justice: Internal and External Factors.

Running Head: ACCESS TO JUSTICE
ACCESS TO JUSTICE
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author’s Note

ACCESS TO JUSTICE1
Access to Justice is a worldwide problem owing to various internal and external factors.
However, it has been said by Arthurs (2014), that the law societies do not focus to solve the
problem of access of justice but instead provide “alternate legal services” that help the people
who cannot afford legal services1. These people instead, get habituated with the problem and
tend to live with it. It is an inevitable problem because of the concept of a bencher2 which is
operative in nature.
The rule of law and human rights are the core essence of modern democracy. Access to
justice is an important part of protecting such rights. However, the legal system may not be well
accessible for everyone and may cause vulnerability for such communities. Thus, access to
justice include, getting the right data and information about law and its application,
understanding of a legal problem and knowing about the remedies available for the same, getting
the right help at the right time for the right issue which essentially starts from getting a right
lawyer, being able to make your opinions delivered when the laws are made. There are lot of
issues related to the access of justice including education, literacy levels, financial background of
people, access to law and information, past traumas in relation with legal processes and
hesitation to go through the same again.
Law societies are institutional in nature meaning they act only in compatibility with their own
concept and does not consider the affording capacity of the people to avail such legal services.
Benchers are goal oriented. They perform pro-bono services which are free of cost amount to
community services which is an essential inclusion to become a judge. Therefore, the cause of
problem for access to justice is mainly the lack of economies of scale in the practice of legal
1 Harry Arthurs, Professor Emeritus, Osgoode Hall Law School, at York University, Toronto:
“The Future of Law School: Three Visions and a Prediction,” (2014), 51:4 Alberta Law
Review 705-716
2 Law Society Act Section 1(1)

ACCESS TO JUSTICE2
profession. According to Arthurs (2014), the major problems to the access of justice is caused by
the Government and law societies. Governments fail to make provision for the accountability of
law societies to create adequacy of legal services with all competence, ethical and affordability.
Secondly, it is the fault of government to not provide adequate resources to operate efficiently
like lack of number of courts, judges, prosecutors, and others including the funding for legal Aid
services3. Law societies are to be held responsible because of their failure to solve the
affordability problem of the legal services which is now deeply embedded in the justice system
devastating it to its core. Thus, if legal services provided by the lawyers and advocates were
affordable and within the reach of the poor, then the practice of law would not have been
commercialized as a profession. The economic issues of the people and its contrast with
commercialization of legal profession has led to the shrinking of the professional foundation and
delivery of justice. In Royal Bank of Canada Trust Corp. v. Secretary of State for Defence
(2003)4, it was laid down that the Government has restrictions on the usage of Alternate Dispute
Resolution System. The parties in the case were ready to adopt mediation as a means to their
dispute resolution but the Defence Ministry rejected the plea for mediation stating that the issue
involved in the case is that of law and thus, it is unsuitable for mediation. However, in court, the
Ministry was favored for the decision but was not awarded any costs for the litigation. The High
Court stated the reason for such decision is the result of Ministry’s refusal to refer the case to
mediation. If a case involves a rule of law to be in dispute, the case by itself does not become
unsuitable for mediation. The parties to the case should have complete freedom to choose
compulsory mediation at their will and free consent5. Thus, Government cannot govern the free
3 Chasse, Ken. "No Votes in Justice Means More Wrongful Convictions." Available at SSRN
2790625 (2016).
4 [2003] EWHC (Ch) 1479 (Eng.).
5 Genn, Hazel. "What is Civil Justice For-Reform, ADR, and Access to Justice." Yale JL & Human. 24
(2012): 397.

ACCESS TO JUSTICE3
will of the parties to choose their system of dispute resolution. Government is responsible for the
poor economy of the people and it should try to uplift the affordability of its people. In other
words, Government should look for employment opportunities, growth and development of
country along with its citizens, provide them enough opportunity to earn and afford the services
that is made available to all. at the same time, the law societies should concentrate on regulating
the economic barometer for the advocates to make it accessible for the people to get lawyers
within their economic statuses. However, this does not mean that lawyers are more of social
workers. But contribution to the society and its people should be a form of professional ethics as
law is a discipline to serve people whose rights have been infringed by state or any other
individual or corporation.
According to Albiston and Sandefur (2013)6, legal profession is the one responsible for
the problem of access to justice. The main reason behind the same is obtaining of legal assistance
and participating actively in the legal system and its reformation process. It has been explained
that obtaining legal information means that it is not possible for the common man to understand
the legal and generic language of the law. legal language is very complex and very specific to its
objectivity. Interpretation of legal language is not something that is efficiently done by a
common law not having any expertise in law. people are more converse with the standard and
plain language and therefore, the legal language of law becomes a barrier to the access of justice
due to its complex language. Understanding of plain language is far easier for the common
people that the understanding of core language. The other reason behind the responsibility of
legal profession in the problem of access to justice participating efficiently in the legal system. It
means that even if the person has access to knowledge and has well understanding of it, the
6 Albiston, Catherine R., and Rebecca L. Sandefur. "Expanding the empirical study of access to
justice." Wis. L. Rev. (2013): 101.