In the Sept. 16 decision Applicants listed in Schedule A v. Canada (Indigenous Services), 2025 FC 1524, Julia Valencia, who was not a lawyer, sought leave to “act as the authorized litigation representative of the Applicants.”
The applicants were about 250 children who are awaiting a decision by Indigenous Services Canada (ISC) on their request for funding as per Jordan’s principle. They had received services funded by Jordan’s principle and provided by an organization known as Roots and Wings Therapeutic Services Inc., but their request to renew the funding for the current fiscal year remained pending for several months.
This resulted in Roots and Wings being forced to discontinue its services. In an affidavit, the director of the organization described the consequences of withdrawal of services for some beneficiaries, including two cases of suicide ideation and apprehension by child and family services. However, there was little information on what the services were. Valencia described it as applied behaviour analysis therapy.
She claimed that she had over 25 years of experience in Indigenous child and youth services and was the founder of an organization called the National Indigenous Advocacy Services for Children, assisting over 600 Indigenous families who applied to ISC under Jordan’s principle.
A previous judge directed the application to be filed despite not being prepared by a lawyer, and ordered that by Sept. 26, the applicants must appoint a lawyer or file a motion for leave to be represented by a non-lawyer.
The court noted that it has occasionally authorized non-lawyers to represent other persons under an exception to rule 119 of the Federal Court Rules. Such orders required “unusual circumstances,” and this is the same under rule 121, which considers class actions. A relevant factor to consider is any barrier to access to justice, such as a limited command of English or an inability to pay for a lawyer. These factors must be proven.
The rules are based on the idea that only lawyers should be allowed to represent litigants before the court due to quality of representation, extensive training, code of ethics and liability insurance. The Supreme Court of Canada has stated that “access to justice is not furthered when non-lawyers are allowed to represent litigants in Court.”
Valencia’s main argument was the urgency of the matter. Justice Sébastien Grammond did not dispute this, but said he failed to see how this was a relevant factor to grant the motion.
“I am not convinced that she is able to proceed more quickly than a lawyer. In truth, the way she has conducted the proceeding over the last two weeks suggests that the reverse is true. The urgency of the matter only strengthens the need for legal representation,” he wrote.
The degree of urgency may be overstated, he added, noting that the suicide ideation issue was brought to ISC in June and the applicants waited two months to bring the present application, suggesting court intervention was not urgently needed. Roots and Wings’ director’s report suggested that one of the two children’s safety was ensured, providing no information on the other.
The court inferred that one ground of the motion was the applicants’ inability to retain a lawyer or pay the associated costs. However, emails and text messages suggested that Valencia “succeeded in persuading the director … to disregard advice from experienced counsel, based on her assertion that she could obtain the same result more quickly and, one assumes, at a lesser cost.” The court found no evidence that the applicants were unable to pay for a lawyer.
“Each Applicant’s parents signed a consent form including a statement that reads, ‘I am experiencing financial hardship and am unable to pay the Federal Court’s judicial review filing fee,’” noted Justice Grammond. “This single sentence appearing in a standard form prepared in advance is insufficient to prove the impecuniosity of each of the Applicants.”
Further, there was no evidence that Roots and Wings, which was said to have 30 employees, lacked resources to pay for a lawyer. The submissions noted that the director personally funded salaries and partial programming at a cost of over $2 million. The court presumed this was done after Jordan’s principle funding ran out.
It further noted that a recent case was heard on Jordan’s principle in which the applicants were represented by a lawyer. The case was expedited, reinforcing that retaining a lawyer will not result in undue delay. As well, the complexity of the case favoured representation by a lawyer as cases involving Jordan’s principle “are typically complex and involve difficult legal concepts that non-lawyers cannot be expected to master.”
While the court did not dispute that Valencia may have in-depth knowledge of ISC’s procedures, “dealing with a government department and mastering the judicial process are starkly different things.”
Justice Grammond concluded that Valencia did not have the knowledge and skills necessary to adequately represent the applicants. She did not seem to understand the criteria and procedure to obtain interlocutory relief and was unfamiliar with the scope of the evidentiary burden. She also did not provide meaningful legal submissions. The lack of competence was more serious as she was seeking to represent over 200 individuals.
“The rights of many persons could be put in jeopardy without the guarantees associated with membership in a law society,” the court wrote. “The circumstances of the present case are far removed from situations where this Court allowed an individual to be represented by a family member.”
Exceptional circumstances were not shown. The motion was dismissed, and the applicants were to appoint a lawyer by Sept. 26.
The applicants were represented by Valencia.
Counsel for the respondent was Darren Grunau.
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