Legal Services Task Team Releases Final Report
The Legal Services Task Team, appointed in 2017 to examine the possibility of allowing non-lawyers to provide some legal services, has released its final report.
The Task Team was a joint project headed by the Ministry of Justice and the Law Society of Saskatchewan. It brought together 11 members, each with a different background relating to legal services. The report includes a number of recommendations on how the regulation of legal services can be changed to improve the provision of legal services and access to justice in the province.
“I would like to thank the members of the Legal Services Task Team for their hard work on this report,” Justice Minister and Attorney General Don Morgan said. “I look forward to reviewing their recommendations and working with the Law Society on any potential changes they would like to see for their profession.”
The recommendations include:
- providing greater clarity to service providers about what legal services are regulated;
- expanding the list of exceptions to the prohibition against practicing law to recognize existing service providers;
- providing the Law Society licensing authority to allow service providers to practice law with a limited license on a case-by-case basis;
- modernizing the legislation regulating legal services to provide more flexibility for future developments in this area;
- creating guidelines to help educate the public about legal services; and
- conducting pilot projects to help develop and test the recommendations.
“The Law Society of Saskatchewan is grateful for the work of the Task Team in examining this complex issue,” Law Society of Saskatchewan President Craig Zawada said. “The Benchers are committed to improving access to legal services for the public and look forward to exploring solutions based on the recommendations of the Task Team.”
The Legal Services Task Team conducted significant consultation with the public, lawyers, and other legal service providers in the creation of these recommendations. Their work has been completed and the report is now under the consideration of the Minister of Justice and the Benchers of the Law Society of Saskatchewan.
The full report can be viewed at http://publications.gov.sk.ca/documents/9/107840-Legal%20Services%20Task%20Team%20Report%20August%2014,%202018.pdf