Province uses federal funding boost to raise pay for legal aid lawyers

After months of escalating job action from Alberta defence lawyers, the province suddenly announced Wednesday that it will increase pay for lawyers who take legal aid clients.

It's an about-face from the government's previous position that changes won't be considered until after a review of the system, with Justice Minister Tyler Shandro saying increases would be looked at in the 2023 budget.

On Wednesday, he said increased federal funding provided “an opportunity to increase legal aid funding earlier than anticipated.”

But Criminal Trial Lawyers' Association president Danielle Boisvert said the increase is less than they're asking for, and it doesn't necessarily signal the end of job action that began last month.

Members of four different criminal defence lawyer organizations recently stopped taking any new legal aid cases as part of an effort to push for more funding for the legal aid system. They continue to call for change to address what they call “perpetual funding neglect” undermining low-income Albertans' access to legal representation.

The government said Wednesday that it will raise the legal aid tariff, which is how defence lawyers get paid through arms-length organization Legal Aid Alberta, by a little more than eight per cent. That bumps pay for roster lawyers to $100 per hour.

But Boisvert said defence lawyers are asking for a tariff increase of closer to 20 per cent to deal with pay disparities between Alberta and other provinces, plus the crush of inflation.

She said there likely won't be any decision on the future of job action until next week.

“What has changed is that they've been saying, `We can't even look at this until this tariff modernization is complete,'” she said.

“Whether or not it means our members are going to get back to work and stop this job action, that will be up to them. It'll take some time to digest.”

Financial eligibility guidelines will also be increased by the same rate, slightly raising the maximum household income someone can have to qualify for legal aid. For a single person, that raises the qualifying yearly income from slightly over $20,000 to about $21,600.

“Adding that on to $20,000 a year doesn't increase the number of people that can access legal aid services by very much,” Boisvert said.

Lawyers have been pressing the government to revamp the financial eligibility guidelines for legal aid, saying that people on AISH and those making as little as $25,000 a year don't qualify for the program.

According to the province, the legal aid pay raise boosts Alberta from sixth to fourth among the provinces in terms of the hourly tariff rate.

The changes will be in effect for the rest of the fiscal year, “until permanent changes can be determined.”