BarTalk June 2002
Volume 14, Number 3

Small Claims Court

by The Honourable Judge J Gary Cohen

It is Monday morning and I am sitting in Courtroom 10 today. That means that I am in Surrey’s Small Claims Court.

I arrive at work at about 8:45 a.m. to find today’s stack of files on my desk. There are nine applications and two trials set for the morning. The afternoon list is a little lighter with five applications, but another two trials.

The first application is for judgment in default of filing a Reply. I verify proof of service, check if the matter is damages or debt, make myself a few notes and move on. The next one is an application to set aside a default judgment. I note that this is the second default judgment taken against this defendant. The first one was for failing to file a Reply and this second one is for failing to attend the settlement conference. I make more notes and continue through the rest of the files.

The Small Claims Court clerk is very prompt. I know that I had best be ready on time. Today is no exception; she arrives and we head into court right at 9:30 a.m.

However, the applications do not go smoothly. At least the defendant seeking to have the second default judgment set aside fails to show up, yet again. At 10:30 a.m. I dismiss his application and order that he not file any further applications without first obtaining leave from me.

At 10:45 a.m. we have not yet had our morning break and so I canvass the two trials to see if either would prefer an adjournment. No luck. They both want to go ahead. I have already checked the files and know that one is substantially older than the other. Neither has any other factor entitling it to priority so I order the older one to go ahead. I apologize to the other parties and send them to the judicial case manager. We then stand down for the morning recess.

After the recess I begin the trial. It is a wrongful dismissal case in which the Claimant says that he was fired for refusing to commit an illegal act. He was a property manager who was told to take the door off of a suite while the tenant was still living there with a small child. She was in the midst of a dispute with the landlord who was trying to evict her. That dispute was before the Residential Tenancy Board at the time. She eventually won and the landlord was not allowed to evict her. However, the property manager was fired for refusing to remove the door from her apartment. By the lunch break I have finished the trial, having found in favour of the Claimant.

The rest of the day goes a little better and, at 4:45 p.m., I have made it through both of the afternoon trials. This is an average day, neither lighter nor heavier than usual.

In Small Claims Court we rarely have lawyers unless it is a motor vehicle accident case. While the monetary amounts may be smaller, the issues are just as difficult as are found in any civil court. We have no articling clerks, no research assistants, one secretary for every eight or nine judges and (until recently in my court building) only one networked printer, a floor up and a half block of corridors away.

Despite the lack of counsel to assist us through able argument, and despite the lack of resources to support us in our job, we are expected to give reasoned, legally sound judgments, most often orally at the end of the trial and without time for reflection. We are, by law, obligated to provide litigants with resolution of their cases in a “just, speedy, inexpensive and simple manner.” To do so we must schedule, on average, four trials each and every day.

The view from this Small Claims Court bench is exciting, varied and intense.

It is a view like no other.

This article was published in the June 2002 issue of BarTalk and is subject to the copyright by the British Columbia Branch of the Canadian Bar Association, 2005, all rights reserved.