Quebec wants to take over family matters from Superior Court

The Legault government wants to strip the Superior Court, which is a federal jurisdiction, of its family matters and entrust them to a Unified Family Court within the Court of Quebec.

The Minister of Justice, Simon Jolin-Barrette, thus took a first step in this direction on Tuesday by tabling his bill 91.

“This is a first step towards ensuring that all jurisdictions are under the same umbrella,” he said at a press conference in parliament, deploring the “labyrinthine journey” of certain families.  

Bill 91 is the result of a recommendation from the Laurent Commission: it aims to simplify the processing of family cases through mediation and conciliation, but also to formally entrust elements of the new family law regime established by the Minister, namely civil union, parental union and surrogacy, to the new Unified Tribunal.

The minister even invited Ottawa in advance not to contest his approach.  

“We should not, for constitutional reasons, make it more difficult for Quebec families experiencing family disputes.”

Currently, in matters of youth protection, adoption and criminal matters, in cases of family, marital or sexual violence, it is the Court of Quebec that decides. It also handles applications relating to the custody of a child when it is already seized of a file in matters of adoption or youth protection.

But the Superior Court has exclusive jurisdiction over divorce matters, including claims for child support, access or custody and division of property.

Ultimately, Jolin-Barrette hopes that the Court of Quebec can also recover this area of ​​jurisdiction.

Because according to him, “family law embodies our civil law tradition and our distinct social values,” he argued.  

“Family law is at the heart of what contributes to making Quebec a profoundly different society and must take into account the cultural, legal and institutional specificities that characterize our nation.”

He deplores the fact that currently, families sometimes have to “navigate” between the Court of Quebec and the Superior Court.

The minister recalled a case mentioned by the Laurent commission. 

The child was a five-year-old whose custody had been awarded to his father by a Superior Court judgment following a separation, while the mother had to pay alimony. 

After a report, the DPJ confirmed that the child was a victim of physical abuse by the father. The DPJ obtained from the Youth Division of the Court of Quebec that the child be entrusted to the mother. The mother then had to apply to the Superior Court to modify custody and child support. 

Then, at the end of an investigation, the Director of Criminal and Penal Prosecutions brought criminal charges against the father in the Criminal and Penal Division of the Court of Quebec.

“This labyrinthine route is (…) incredibly complex,” said Jolin-Barrette. 

But his bill does not yet address this. However, he wants to simplify the trajectory of families by promoting the principle of “one family, one judge.”

In addition, it would impose a mediation process for parents in a parental or civil union who separate, in order to avoid, if possible, the dispute being brought to court. 

Parents with dependent children would be entitled to five hours of free mediation, those without dependent children to three hours.

Subsequently, if there is an agreement, they would have access to a homologation service to have their agreement ratified without having to appear before a judge. The government would thus be expanding the homologation assistance service already in place. 

And if mediation fails, the parents, if they both consent, should undertake a conciliation process before a judge and if an agreement is reached, the judge will make it official. 

Otherwise, the magistrate will hold a summary hearing on the same day to decide and a judgment will be rendered no later than 30 days after the hearing. 

Let us recall that the CAQ government has made significant changes to family law in recent years.

Jolin-Barrette thus modernized the rules of filiation, knowledge of origins and regulated surrogate pregnancy. He also created the parental union, a new Quebec regime for common-law spouses with children. 

–This report by La Presse Canadienne was translated by CityNews