Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank you, Minister, for your presentation.
As you know, Minister, we in the Liberal caucus supported this bill at second reading. We agree with you that it's an important measure to improve access to the judicial system. The specific claims process will obviously exert additional pressure. Your statistics and your information on that are certainly compelling.
I know from former partners of mine and people I know in the profession that in my own province of New Brunswick—and you and your officials know this as well—the delay is often related to the family courts. I've heard the chief justice at a number of events talk about the pressure on the unified family court, and I know that some of the planning and some of the requests have gone in around family courts in some provinces, such as my own.
For a whole bunch of reasons, the caseloads have increased. I assume it's your intention, in consultation with the chief justices, to deal with the backlogs in family courts. In some jurisdictions in New Brunswick, people will wait eight months to get an interim motion before the court. That obviously is, in difficult circumstances around family matters, not a very ideal situation.
I'd be interested to hear your comments on that, Minister.
But also, with respect to the linguistic makeup of the courts, in my province of New Brunswick—as you know, the only officially bilingual province—some judicial districts feel greater linguistic pressure than others, even in my own province. I hope you would be sensitive, when you make these appointments and others, and try to recognize that in some cases the linguistic makeup.... And it's not just about having an anglophone who says he or she speaks French, or a francophone who pretends that he or she speaks English. Many litigants will in fact not want to appear before the court because there's a legitimate concern that the judge may or may not understand some of the subtleties of language, and therefore you have dockets that tend to become overloaded as well.
I'm wondering whether you would be open to looking at a balance. As I say, every province has its different circumstances. But in my own, I know the bar is worried about this, and I'd be interested to hear whether you're sensitive to that as well.