This chapter synthesises the report’s findings and discusses their implications for access to justice policy in Canada. It considers the distribution of justice problems, the ways individuals navigate justice pathways, and the social and economic consequences associated with unmet justice needs. The chapter identifies key areas for policy attention and examines opportunities to strengthen the effectiveness, accessibility and responsiveness of the justice system. Drawing on the evidence presented throughout the report, the chapter explores policy approaches to prevention, early intervention, access to assistance and dispute resolution. It also considers the role of data and evidence in supporting responsive justice policies and informing decision making, resource allocation and performance monitoring.
Justice Services, Economic Burden and Social Costs in Canada
Abstract
This study on the social costs of justice problems in Canada has generated substantive findings in six areas:
The study has drawn from multiple data sources in order to provide estimates of the annual incidence rates of the most significant justice problems in Canada, which confirm and consolidate prior knowledge on common legal problems.
The study has also analysed evidence on the justice pathways followed by people in trying to address these problems, mapping limitations in access to justice across civil and criminal justice problems.
The study’s evaluation of increased risks for specific groups of the population constitutes new evidence on systemic inequalities in access to justice.
The study’s evaluation of the social costs of justice problems provides a comprehensive appraisal of the variety of burdens that justice problems and their handling impose on society.
The study finally investigated the influence of justice pathways on the impacts and costs of justice problems.
Through its background research, the study has produced an extensive mapping of Canadian literature and data sources on justice, in which some gaps in evidence appear.
The following subsections review the study’s key findings in each of these areas.
5.1.1. Scale and distribution of justice problems
The 2025 National Justice Survey reveals that 39% of Canadians experienced at least one serious legal problem in the past three years – a figure that is aligned with the results of previous rounds of LNS conducted in Canada in the past two decades, with the exception of the CLPS which was carried out during the COVID-19 crisis. The study estimates annual rates on incidence consistent with these results, which it complements with crime victimisation data, providing a detailed and comprehensive overview of the occurrence of justice problems in Canada.
The analysis reveals that property crimes, violent crimes, medical treatment issues and discrimination represent the most common justice problems in Canada, affecting between 4% and 17% of the population aged 15 and more every year (see Figure 5.1). Employment, consumer, debt and money, housing and will execution issues come next, with incidence rates of about 2%.
Source: Authors’ calculations based on NJS 2025, GSS 2019 and SSPPS 2018 data.
5.1.2. Significant attrition in justice pathways
The study’s data reveals stark contrasts in the justice pathways that people follow in seeking to address their legal problems. Across this diversity, the study finds substantial attrition experienced at almost every step of justice pathways: while people facing a serious justice problem often know where to get information and help, access to professional assistance can be problematic in certain problem areas; in most areas, only a small share of cases are addressed through formal dispute resolution mechanisms; as a consequence, the vast majority of justice problems remain unresolved after several months (see Figure 5.2).
Legal capability is most robust for property crime and violent crime (where it is defined as the knowledge that victimisation should be reported to the police after a criminal act has been committed), as well as family and child custody disputes, employment and work injury issues. It is below 50% only for two problem areas: discrimination and medical treatment issues.
The share of people who receive professional assistance in addressing their justice problems is higher than the share of those with legal capability in several areas, most notably for family, will execution, housing and medical treatment issues. In these areas, people who did not have prior knowledge of justice procedures have nevertheless had access to professional advice – even though, as explained below, opportunities to benefit from such assistance are not evenly distributed among groups of population. By contrast, over half of the victims of violent or property crime who have legal capability report that they do not use professional assistance, reflecting both limitations in access and the choice of many victims not to take action.1
Access to dispute-resolution is very limited: fewer than one in six serious civil problems ever reach a court or alternative forum and only about one in four violent or property crimes are reported to the police. Family issues are the only area in which over 40% of disputes are addressed through a dispute resolution mechanism. The contrast with the legal assistance indicator shows that in all areas, many people choose not to engage in a formal dispute resolution process, including after they have benefitted from professional advice.
Resolution rates, finally, are low: across areas, a majority of cases remained unsolved at the time of the surveys. In the two areas with the highest resolution rates, namely will execution and employment issues, over half of the cases that are resolved have not proceeded through a formal mechanism. Other areas of civil disputes have resolution rates between 19% (discrimination cases) and 35% (housing issues). Property and violent crimes have the lowest rates of resolution (defined as cases in which the police identify the offender and take further actions) – beneath 15%.
In % of people experiencing a serious problem
Source: Authors’ calculations based on CLPS 2021 and GSS 2019 data.
The comparative evidence indicates multiple areas with room for improvement.
People facing discrimination and medical treatment issues – the two most prevalent civil justice problems according to the 2025 NJS – experience challenges at every step of their justice pathways – from the lowest levels of legal capability through very limited access to professional assistance and dispute resolution mechanisms to rates of unresolved problems that are only surpassed by crime categories.
In other areas of civil justice, levels of legal capability and use of professional legal assistance are generally higher; the low levels of problem resolution in these areas, particularly for consumer and debt and money issues, is in part due to the lack of access to dispute resolution mechanisms.
The analysis of justice pathways for violent and property crime issues shows that close to 70% of victims know that they can report their problem to the police (legal capability indicator) but choose not to do so (dispute resolution mechanism indicator). Even accounting for the large share of petty crimes that victims do not deem worthy of reporting,2 such rates of inaction are indicative of a substantial gap in access to legal advice, law enforcement services, and courts.
5.1.3. Systemic inequalities towards specific groups
This study confirms persistent systemic inequalities within Canada's justice system.
When other demographic factors are controlled for, Indigenous peoples face substantially higher odds of experiencing serious justice problems across virtually every problem area examined, with likelihood exceeding twice the population’s average for work injuries, violent crime and family issues, and more than three times higher for discrimination.
Similarly, low-income individuals experience heightened risks across multiple problem areas, particularly debt and money issues and family and child custody matters.
Visible minorities are 60% more likely than the overall population to have debt and money issues, twice as likely to experience housing issues, three times as likely to face discrimination.
Women are particularly exposed to medical treatment issues, family issues and violent crime, particularly sexual assault.
These disparities extend beyond problem incidence to justice pathways. Visible minorities, Indigenous peoples and those with lower education levels consistently face barriers in accessing legal capability and professional assistance and resolving the problems that they face. Access to dispute resolution, by contrast, is less unequal between the examined groups of the population, but generally low.
5.1.4. The economic burden of justice problems
The study estimated the social costs generated by the twelve most significant justice problems in Canada at CAD 57.5 billion, representing 2.4% of the country's GDP in 2021. This substantial economic burden reflects not only direct costs to the justice system but also cascading effects on individuals, families and communities. Domestic violence emerges as the costliest category at 30% of total costs, followed by violent crime (29%), medical treatment issues (16%), workplace injuries (6%) and property crime (5%) (Figure 5.3).
Personal costs constitute the bulk of the social costs of justice problems, particularly the intangible costs suffered by victims of domestic violence, violent crime, and non-compliance with laws and regulations in areas such as medical treatment issues and workplace injuries.
The study’s results on the magnitude of the costs of domestic violence and violent crime confirm findings from earlier research, particularly the cost of crime studies carried out by Justice Canada. They highlight the considerable burden imposed on women, who constitute the majority of victims in both categories. Over half of the costs of violent crime are generated by sexual assaults, which women are four times as likely to face as men.
In % of total costs
Source: Authors’ calculations (see detailed sources in Annex A).
The study provides a more novel perspective on the costs of medical treatment issues and injuries and diseases at work. Yet these are two areas with sizeable health impacts including numerous fatalities (over 9 000 and 1 000 respectively in 2021), part of which are deemed to be preventable through better procedures and observance of regulations and standards. By making conservative assumptions regarding the share of such preventable impacts, the study has probably underestimated the actual social cost of these problems.
When focusing on civil justice problems, these two areas represent almost two thirds of the total estimated costs (Figure 5.4). Family, will execution and employment issues together represent less than 20% of the total, while being the most costly categories in terms of justice process expenditures (lawyer fees, court costs).
In % of total costs of civil justice problems
Source: Authors’ calculations (see detailed sources in Annex A).
5.1.5. The value of improved justice pathways
The study provides additional evidence that effective justice pathways significantly reduce the adverse impacts of legal problems. Once relevant factors are accounted for, individuals with legal capability – the ability to recognise legal issues and know where to seek help – have approximately 20% less chance of experiencing high financial costs when addressing justice problems. Access to resolution mechanisms and successful problem resolution substantially reduce the likelihood of experiencing extreme stress, physical and mental health expenses and other cascading effects.
These findings align with international evidence demonstrating that the benefits of providing effective justice services significantly outweigh costs, with studies showing that for every dollar invested in assistance, multiple dollars in social costs are avoided through improved health outcomes, prevented family breakdown, and reduced system utilisation.
5.1.6. The state of evidence on justice problems and their costs
The study is based on an extensive review of the literature and data sources on justice problems and their impacts and costs, focusing particularly on Canadian sources.
The review highlights areas in which a rich body of evidence has been produced by researchers and practitioners through years of investigation. This concerns in particular multiple large-scale surveys that have regularly consulted Canadians regarding their everyday experience of justice-related problems, including different rounds of legal needs, crime victimisation, and other, more targeted surveys. A constant objective of these surveys has been to investigate differences in the conditions and experiences of particular groups of populations, including Indigenous peoples, visible minorities, women, and youth.
This data has fed into numerous in-depth analyses of personal pathways in addressing these problems, which were abundantly referenced in this study.
The study was also able to collect detailed and consistent data and draw from in-depth analyses in specific sectors such as healthcare, housing, occupational health and safety, court cases, and legal aid.
By contrast, background data was unavailable or too fragmented in several areas, which in turn results in relative paucity of research material. These include:
Court expenditures at federal and provincial levels, for which the most recent source of consolidated data dates from 2002/2003.
Alternative dispute resolution mechanisms, for which consolidated data was not found.
People in correctional facilities, on which there are no regular and nation-wide statistics collected, making it difficult to analyse the characteristics of that population and the effects of incarceration at a national level.
Reported cases of discrimination, on which (despite the efforts of certain provincial Human Rights Commissions) there is no systematic collection of standardised data, making it difficult to contrast self-reported cases of victimisation with a measure of administrative cases.
There is also a lack of integrated, longitudinal data that would permit linking individual experiences of justice problems and journey through justice institutions with health, social and economic outcomes and monitoring cross-system dynamics.
The study’s key findings underscore the need for systematic reform toward justice more centred on people in Canada, emphasising four areas: strengthening prevention through targeted interventions, addressing systemic inequity, improving justice pathways by enhancing area-specific legal capability and support, and generating better data and knowledge to support evidence-based approaches to investment in justice.
Targeting prevention of justice problems
The evidence from this study confirms that the largest social and economic burdens stem from a concentrated set of justice problems: domestic violence, violent crime (notably sexual assault), medical treatment issues, and work-related injuries and diseases. These areas account for the lion’s share of social costs attributable to justice problems. The impacts are especially severe for women and for historically marginalised groups, both in terms of direct personal harm and broader societal repercussions.
Addressing these justice problems early in their development prevents escalation and reduces long-term costs. Justice problems often create cascading effects triggering additional issues across multiple life domains – social factors such as income, employment, stable housing, education, and health, which can be considered as “social determinants of justice” (Justice Canada, 2023[1]). The concept of legal needs encompasses not only formal legal intervention aimed at creating appropriate incentives to prevent problems, but also the provision of information, advice and support before problems reach crisis points.
5.2.1. Equity-focused, tailored policy responses
Early intervention proves particularly valuable for vulnerable populations who face multiple interconnected problems. The analysis shows that Indigenous peoples, visible minorities and low-income individuals are more likely to experience severe impacts from unresolved justice problems, making early identification and intervention critical for preventing deeper entrenchment in cycles of legal difficulty.
Persistent disparities are apparent across nearly all major justice problem types and at each phase along the justice pathway. Indigenous peoples are overrepresented among those experiencing and those accused of justice problems, as observed in work injuries, family breakdown, and violent crime. Visible minorities are disproportionately affected in domains such as housing, financial hardship, and criminal matters. Addressing these entrenched gaps requires robust, differentiated, and equity-focused responses.
Canada has recognised this challenge and is implementing several national and federal justice strategies targeting and designed in co-leadership with affected communities. These include the Indigenous Justice Strategy, Canada’s Black Justice Strategy, the National Action Plan to End Gender-Based Violence (GBV), and the Federal Victims Strategy. The Indigenous Justice Strategy commits to expanding Indigenous-led diversion, justice, and community healing initiatives (Justice Canada, 2025[2]). Canada’s Black Justice Strategy aims to address anti-Black racism and transform practices across the criminal justice system (Justice Canada, 2023[1]; African Canadian Civic Engagement Council, 2025[3]). The National Action Plan on GBV commits to survivor-centred, trauma-informed approaches to end violence against women, in both criminal and civil systems (Women and Gender Equality Canada, 2022[4]). The Federal Victims Strategy seeks to increase access to justice for victims and survivors of crime and give victims a more effective voice in the criminal justice system (Department of Justice Canada, 2021[5]) .
5.2.2. Effective justice pathways and early resolution
This assessment reveals substantial attrition at every stage of the justice pathway. Legal capability is highly variable, and many individuals—especially in medical harm contexts—lack both awareness of their rights and the means to act. The variation in legal capability across different problem types—from 34% for medical treatment issues to 74% for family and child custody issues—suggests that targeted problem-specific approaches are necessary to design services that match the justice that people want and need and to ensure that people are empowered.
Where navigation, outreach, and early access to competent assistance exist, such as in some family law or community-led Indigenous and justice services for visible minorities, the likelihood of both reaching and achieving resolution increases, and costs to individuals and society drop accordingly. The converse is true when such support is absent: unresolved cases compound into deeper hardship, reinforcing cycles of disadvantage.
These findings argue for expanded early intervention, public legal education, and plain language supports, with tailored provision for high-risk groups in the areas generating the greatest social cost.
5.2.3. Generating better data and knowledge for evidence-based investments
While Canada is a global leader in multiple areas of justice information, significant areas for improvement exist. For several priority problem areas—such as outcomes and recidivism in correctional settings, and the functioning of alternative dispute resolution—data remains fragmented or nationally unavailable. Moreover, the collection of disaggregated information on outcomes for Indigenous, Black, or other groups most impacted by justice problems could be extended from survey instruments to judiciary and administrative data. Finally, longitudinal panel data could provide a wealth of information on the justice pathways and outcomes and their relations with other sectoral dynamics.
Part of these gaps have started to be addressed through the robust monitoring and evaluation frameworks included in the national justice strategies – provided that these frameworks are mainstreamed into regular and comprehensive statistical programmes. Furthering this progress will be critical for producing the type of evidence base that would ensure resources are effectively targeted, results can be assessed, and corrective action is timely.
The approach used in this study—a combination of incidence mapping, pathways analysis and cost assessment, carried out with an equity lens, drawing on multiple data sources—provides an illustration of how data and research findings can be used to produce evidence-based inputs into justice policymaking.
Regular legal needs surveys enable jurisdictions to monitor changes in problem incidence, track the effectiveness of interventions and identify emerging justice needs.
Complementing the evidence on legal needs with broad-based evaluations of social impacts and costs helps to account for the cost-benefit profile of investments in justice. This granular understanding enables policymakers to target resources toward the most cost-effective interventions while addressing the most significant sources of social harm.
References
[3] African Canadian Civic Engagement Council (2025), Canada’s Black Justice Strategy Community Engagement Report.
[6] Cotter, A. (2021), “Criminal victimization in Canada 2019”, Juristat, No. 41, https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/pub/85-002-x/2021001/article/00014-eng.htm.
[5] Department of Justice Canada (2021), Evaluation of the Justice Canada Federal Victims Strategy: Final Evaluation Report, https://www.justice.gc.ca/eng/rp-pr/cp-pm/eval/rep-rap/2021/victims-victimes/docs/justice-fvs-evaluation-report-eng.pdf.
[2] Justice Canada (2025), Canada’s Indigenous Justice Strategy: What We Learned Report, Government of Canada.
[1] Justice Canada (2023), Canada’s Black Justice Strategy, https://www.justice.gc.ca/eng/cj-jp/cbjs-scjn/hoodfams/p1.html.
[4] Women and Gender Equality Canada (2022), In Brief: National Action Plan to End Gender-Based Violence, https://www.canada.ca/content/dam/wage-fegc/documents/gbv/National%20Action%20Plan%20on%20Gender-based%20Violence%20-%20In%20Brief%20-%20English.pdf.
← 1. See also (Cotter, 2021[6]).