Originially from: World Arbitration and Mediation Review (WAMR)

The Conciliation Service Program of the Court of Appeal of Quebec
by
The Honorable Louise Otis, J.C.A.
Judge, Court of Appeal of Québec

[This article was prepared initially for the NAFTA
Advisory Committee on Private Commercial
Disputes in the Alternative Dispute Resolution for
Judges & Businesses Conference held in Mexico
City, June 1999]
The Canadian judicial system exists within a federal political structure. The
federal parliament (located in Ottawa) and the ten provincial parliaments all enact
laws in their respective fields of competence. According to the Canadian
Constitution, each province has exclusive responsibility for the administration of
justice.
The Court of Appeal of Québec is the highest court in Québec. Its twenty
judges have the power to hear appeals from the lower courts. Simply put: the
Court of Appeal is a court of last resort. Very few of its judgments in civil
matters are ever brought to the Supreme Court of Canada. In 1998, for example,
only six appeals from the Québec court were authorized by the Supreme Court of
Canada. It would not be an overstatement to say that 99% of the judgments in
provincial civil matters rendered by the Court of Appeal of Québec are final.
In 1998, under the auspices of the Court of Appeal of Québec, the
conciliation service was implemented as a pilot program at the appellate court.