Announcements

The following updates from all Federal and Provincial Courts will be updated as new information is released. 

The Provincial Court will resume in-person proceedings for priority matters that cannot be accommodated remotely on a staged and incremental basis beginning June 8, 2020.

This Notice provides information for anyone who will appear before the Provincial Court for a remote proceeding beginning May 7, 2020 until further notice. In this Notice, the term “remote proceeding” means a hearing or case conference conducted by audioconference (including telephone or Microsoft Teams) or videoconference (including Microsoft Teams).

The Provincial Court of BC recognizes that the Province is still impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic. The Chief Public Health Officers of Canada and the Province still require people to keep a safe distance from each other, but currently there can be a cautious reopening of public places with health and safety protocols in place to minimize the transmission of the virus. Taking this into account, the Provincial Court has developed the plan set out in this Notice to resume further court operations.

Chief Judge Gillespie has issued five updated notices today. Highlights are outlined below. Please note that while Provincial Court registries are now accepting all filings in-person, people are encouraged to use remote filing options, including email, to reduce the number of people in courthouses.

COVID-19 has ravaged the country’s legal system and precipitated a long backlog of cases that has Attorney General David Eby and his counterparts in other provinces scrambling.

A one-year moratorium and possible elimination of civil juries and mandatory arbitration on motor vehicle litigation are being considered by Attorney General David Eby to ease the burgeoning backlog in B.C. Supreme Court.

This Notice replaces the Notice to the Public Regarding the Court of Appeal for British Columbia’s Response to COVID-19 issued 27 May 2020. It extends the suspension of service and filing deadlines from 15 June to 29 June.

This Notice provides directions on filing documents in civil and criminal appeals. Beginning 14 July 2020 this Notice rescinds and replaces the directions described in section 3.2 of the Notice to the Public Regarding the Court of Appeal’s Response to Covid-19 dated 7 July 2020.

The BC Provincial Court sits in many court locations in the province. Currently, we are working with government and in some cases, local communities, to have the consultant that government has retained view the circuit courts and make recommendations about what steps need to be taken to make those courts safe and accessible to members of the public.