Justice Ready launches online workspace for Ontario self-represented litigants
TORONTO, — Justice Ready, an online workspace designed to help self-represented litigants organize information and prepare documents for Ontario civil proceedings, is launching publicly today. Justice Ready is an authorized participant in the Law Society of Ontario’s Access to Innovation (A2I) program.
Justice Ready helps self-represented litigants involved in Ontario civil proceedings organize case information and evidence for court within a structured online workspace. It guides users through the preparation process and assembles the content they provide into properly formatted court documents, including forms, affidavits and motion records, ready for court filing.
“I’ve navigated the civil court system both with legal representation and as a self-represented litigant. As a self-represented litigant, I found it overwhelming at times to organize and manage evidence, complete court forms, and format documents in accordance with the court’s rules and practice directions. I later trained as a litigation law clerk and worked with lawyers in an administrative capacity. Even with procedural training and specialized software, it can take more than 10 hours to assemble and format some of the more complex court documents.”
“I wanted to make that work more manageable for people facing the same challenges. But because I’m not a lawyer or paralegal, I wasn’t sure whether it would be compliant to offer a tool to the public. After doing some research, I learned about the Law Society’s Access to Innovation program, which inspired me to start building Justice Ready and apply.”
Justice Ready’s broader mission is to increase access to justice by making it more manageable for everyday people to organize and advance a civil case while following the civil courts’ rules, whether they are representing themselves or working with lawyers at key stages of their case on a limited budget.