By Lauryn Kerr, CRT Legal Counsel
On April 1, 2019 the CRT will begin resolving motor vehicle injury disputes. This change will give British Columbians a modern and convenient way to access justice. To prepare for this change, we’re updating the CRT Rules. The newly drafted rules are ready to share with you. We’d like your feedback on them.
What are ‘Rules’?
Courts and tribunals usually have rules. Rules are a bit like a complete instruction guide. They can also restrict parties and the court or tribunal from doing certain things.
Under the Civil Resolution Tribunal Act, we’re required to have a set of rules. The CRT Rules help to make it a fair, transparent, and consistent forum for resolving disputes. The CRT Rules have been in place since we started accepting strata property disputes for resolution in July 2016.
What’s different about the CRT Rules?
The CRT Rules are set by the Tribunal Chair. But we think they belong to all British Columbians. Because of that, we want the rules to be as accessible and understandable as possible.
If you’re familiar with court rules, you’ll probably find the CRT’s rules to be shorter and simpler. We think long, complicated rules are just too confusing for most people to use. We’re trying to take a ‘less is more’ approach with our rules and focus on the information that will be most useful to people.
How will people use the CRT Rules?
If we’re being totally honest – we hope people using the CRT don’t actually have to read the CRT Rules. We try to build processes and guides that speak for themselves, and give you the information you need, when you need it. But when people need or want to read our complete rules, they are available.
Let’s work together on the CRT Rules!
Your feedback on our CRT Rules for strata property and small claims disputes helped us make a lot of improvements and changes. That’s why we’re asking for your help again, on the rules for motor vehicle injury disputes.
We know it can be hard to provide feedback on something like rules. That’s why we want to let you decide how to contribute. Here’s how we set things up:
- Survey: Want us to walk you through the process? Then your best option is our survey. You will provide your feedback by answering some straight-forward questions, and we’ll draw your attention to some of the biggest changes to the rules.
- Write to the CRT: If you’d rather write directly to the CRT, please review the draft rules and email your feedback, attention “Lauryn Kerr”.
We’re accepting feedback until 11:59pm PST on Sunday, February 24, 2019.
This consultation is part of our commitment to build the CRT around the needs of people who will be using it. Your feedback is much appreciated.