Again, there are so many circumstances. For example, you take someone's case and it's an elderly person who has been struck by a car and can't afford to pay you. You go to try to get them some money. In a year or two down the line when their court case finally comes up, they die. It may be natural causes or maybe it's because of ill health. What does the lawyer do in those kinds of cases? Where they have paid taxes, do they get to apply for it back?
It's lost time, which, by the way, to a professional is very expensive.
What I think may end up happening is that many lawyers might say, particularly in more rural areas, they just don't take cases anymore on contingency, because they don't have the client base to subsidize them, to subsidize these extra taxes.
I'm very concerned, Mr. Chair, that this is going to have serious impacts.
I'm not making this up. First of all, I did work in a law office for about a year and a half. I got to know clients, and I got to know how things don't work out the way that we try to arrange life. Life is very messy. The second thing, though, is that I've actually been contacted by people in B.C., members of the bar, who say exactly that. The big firms in the big cities will subsidize these cases because they know that every one out of 10 may win big, but for the smaller firms in the rural areas, people will not be able to access justice.
I really am disappointed with this provision.
I have other things I'd like to talk about, but we'll go to someone else.