In one of our previous blogs we summarized the decision of Vilardell v. Dunham as an important Judgment discussing the paramountcy of an affordable court system.  What remained unclear was whether the Government would implement the decision to eliminate the court fees because the decision actually dealt with Hearing Fees under the old Rules of Court, before various revisions were made.

However, the profession was recently notified on June 1  by the Law Society, that  while the decision is being appealed by the government  the Court Services Branch:

“….has suspended the processing of payments or issuance of invoices for hearing fees for Supreme Court civil jury and non-jury trials and applications under Appendix C, Schedule 1, Items 9 and 10 of the Supreme Court Civil and Family Rules, while the matter of hearing fees is before the courts.”

A small but important step in moving British Columbia forward to a society where our courts are more accessible.