Mayor Rob Grossi helps Carole Sayers and children Brittany and Christian launch Ms Sayers’ new paralegal office at 389 The Queensway S. She can help you with traffic tickets, minor criminal offences and more.
Georgina
October 01, 2008 07:57 PM
Carole Sayers wants to clear up any misconceptions the public may have about paralegals.
Ms Sayers opened her Alternative Legal Services at 389 The Queensway South recently in Keswick and explained what the current role of the paralegal is in Ontario.
“Up until 2008, there really was no such thing as paralegals in Ontario,” she said.
“It is an American term which was adopted by a group of people, such as X-Copper (now bankrupt) and many others representing people in traffic court, small claims, landlord and tenant matters etc., most of whom were uneducated in the field and had no formal training, no insurance, no rights to be giving legal advice, and most importantly, no liability for their actions.”
The issue got so out of hand that the Law Society of Upper Canada, which governs every lawyer in Ontario, was forced to take action.
In early 2007, the law society announced paralegals would soon be governed and licensed by the society and would be regulated as are the lawyers in Ontario.
By Oct. 31, 2007, anyone who wished to be “grandparented” into the newly-established system had to submit an extensive application to the law society.
It had to include education, work experience in the field for three years or more, a criminal record check, references from two acceptable sources, (for example, a judge, lawyer), lots of documentation and the scrutiny of the law society.
Anyone who did not apply by Oct. 31, 2007 was too late and missed the cutoff.
The only way to become a paralegal after that was to attend an accepted college program (three or four years of school) and go through the process as a new paralegal graduate.
“If you were deemed to qualify to be grandparented in to the law, you had to write an extensive examination, prepared by the Law Society of Upper Canada,” Ms Sayers said. “Those, like me, who passed the examination, became the first licensed paralegals in Ontario. So now paralegals are licensed, governed and regulated by the law society.”
Paralegals pay extensive dues and insurance and any name under which they operate must be approved by the law society.
They cannot be incorporated to avoid liability.
“Now, the main problem lies with all of the people out there still practising without licenses and, the fact that public is really not aware that any of this has gone on,” Ms Sayers said.
“Eight out of 10 people you ask don’t know what a paralegal is and even if they are familiar with the term, rarely do they know what we do.”
Sooner than later, the public needs to be made aware of these changes which were made really to protect the public from these unlicensed individuals, many of whom were ripping people off and worse, she added.