Conclusion regarding research potential

Researchers considering undertaking cross-jurisdictional projects about Canada’s out-of-court family dispute resolution services face a number of data issues. Some commonalities between programs do exist; most address a range of child-related issues, have similar success measures and pivoted to providing (more) services virtually during the pandemic. However, this project has also demonstrated that programs vary in the scope of clients served, the range of non-child related issues addressed, length of services provided, fees charged (or not), and connection to the court process. They record data using different units of measurement (e.g., families versus files) and record information at different levels of granularity. These factors make comparing service data between jurisdictions more challenging. Even comparing more “people-focused” data (such as client survey results) that speak more directly to clients’ experiences in accessing to justice would need to consider the differences between programs that impact that access, such geographic scope of service, client eligibility criteria, range of issues addressed and user fees. As always, when conducting research into client experiences regarding access to justice obtaining the views of those who faced barriers and therefore did not access services is very difficult because they are not included in program service records that contain contact information.

Even within jurisdictions, analysis of trends over time would be complicated by the changing circumstances that programs have experienced. For example, research on the impact of the pandemic on access to justice would need to consider service changes that occurred as a result of the pandemic and other program design or context changes that occurred during the same time period. These other service design and context changes would make the attribution of changes in service volumes or success rates to the pandemic alone more difficult. Nonetheless, there is a general willingness to consider participation in research projects and to potentially share collected data.