colin – Tribunal Watch Ontario

February 24, 2026

Court Slams Human Rights Tribunal’s Refusal To Hear Cases

The Ontario Divisional Court has dismantled a major pillar of the Human Rights Tribunal’s unfair drive to reduce its backlog by dismissing most claims without a hearing. In Bokhari v. Top Medical Transportation Services, released on February 20, the Court overturned a Human Rights Tribunal of Ontario (HRTO) decision dismissing a claim without a hearing, […]

December 01, 2025

Success rate for injured applicants at Licence Appeal Tribunal continues to plummet

As a new associate chair with significant political connections is poised to take over, the Licence Appeal Tribunal (LAT) is faced with criticism over the plummeting success rate for people injured in auto accidents who are appealing decisions by insurance companies – a success rate that has dropped precipitously to only 8 per cent. The […]

November 20, 2025

An analysis of abandonments at the Human Rights Tribunal of Ontario

A paper by Emily Shepard published in the most recent issue of the Canadian Journal of Administrative Law & Practice provides a detailed analysis of the HRTO’s increasing use of abandonment as the basis for dismissing thousands of applications without a hearing. This analysis confirms the concerns Tribunal Watch has expressed for several years about […]

November 20, 2025

The Rise of Abandonment Dismissals at the HRTO and Increasing Barriers to Access for Applicants

by Emily Shepard 1. INTRODUCTION This paper is an in-depth study of why and how the Human Rights Tribunal of Ontario (HRTO or Tribunal) is dismissing applications as abandoned, with a focus on abandonment dismissals in 2024. The Tribunal dismissed 934 applications as abandoned in 2024, which accounted for 49% of the Tribunal’s total decisions […]

November 14, 2025

The Landlord and Tenant Board Annual Report: Progress but still a long way to go

Tribunals Ontario has finally released its Annual Report for the period April 1, 2024 – March 31, 2025. Tribunal Watch has reviewed the Landlord and Tenant Board (LTB) section of the Annual Report and offers the following comments. Overall, the Annual Report confirms that, despite a significant reduction in the backlog, landlords and tenants are […]

November 07, 2025

Watch the webinar: Solutions to the ongoing dysfunction at the Landlord and Tenant Board

Recorded on November 4, 2025, 1:00 – 2:30pm The Ontario Landlord and Tenant Board continues to struggle to meet its mandate. While backlogs have been reduced, they are still significant, resulting in continuing delays and dysfunction for both landlords and tenants. The Government of Ontario is considering reform options. These include abolishing the Board in […]

September 09, 2025

The Ontario tribunal where claimants have almost no chance of winning

Toiling in semi-obscurity, the low-profile Health Services Appeal and Review Board (HSARB) seems to have one major mission: dismissing appeals from decisions of OHIP, the Ontario Health Insurance Plan. HSARB is a tribunal with a small caseload but with a stunning uniformity of decisions. The precise current caseload is difficult to determine because HSARB and […]

September 09, 2025

Consultation – what consultation?

The final version of new rules of practice for two health tribunals was posted on the tribunals’ website, while a so-called consultation this summer with stakeholders was still ongoing, raising suspicion that the consultation was a sham. The discovery was made by Amy Wah, a longtime lawyer with the HIV & AIDS Legal Clinic Ontario, […]

August 18, 2025

Increased judicial intervention to correct unfairness at key tribunals

Ontario’s administrative tribunals are facing increased scrutiny by the courts for unfairness in dismissing claims brought by tenants, landlords, employees, car accident victims, and people who believe they have experienced discrimination or who are seeking disability benefits. Tribunals Ontario has been “laser focused” on managing backlogs at its constituent tribunals which include the Landlord and […]

February 14, 2025

Executive Summary for Statement of Concern – Under the Ford Government: Justice Delayed and Denied at Tribunals Ontario

This is an executive summary of our Statement of Concern about Tribunals Ontario. In December 2024, Tribunals Ontario released its much-delayed Annual Report for 2023/24, and despite some self-congratulatory messaging, the data inside, and on the Tribunals Ontario website, demonstrates that there are serious deficits in the quality, accessibility and timeliness of justice at three […]