Honourable senators, every day across Canada hundreds of duty counsel lawyers provide free legal services to disadvantaged people, providing access to justice and fair treatment. This service is essential, and access to justice and legal representation is as important as our right to health care.

Duty counsel lawyers are the emergency room physicians of the justice system. They are the first point of contact for people facing legal challenges. They triage their clients in the same way ER physicians assess their patients. Duty counsel lawyers listen and work to understand an individual’s history, circumstances and goals. They consider the law, the allegations being made and weigh mitigating and aggravating factors. They come up with a plan that works in the client’s best interests. More than that, they refer clients to economic and social supports that help clients manage other social, cultural or economic challenges they may also be facing.

Duty counsel lawyers who deal with adult criminal cases in our large cities hustle hard. In docket court, they can represent dozens of people in a single day, working in courthouses into the evening. Colleagues, this hasn’t been easy to accomplish during the pandemic.

In many cases, the stakes are high. Without duty counsel acting on their behalf, what does a person stand to lose? They stand to lose freedom, a paycheque, a job, housing, their children, their standing in the community, education, friendships, and ties to spiritual and religious supports.

Clearly, the representation that duty counsel lawyers provide every day affects our well-being and the well-being of our nation. They work on behalf of Canadians of all ages, races, genders, sexual orientations, political ideologies, religious beliefs, physical and mental abilities and in any language. They give voice to those unable to speak for themselves and bring guidance when hope is faint.

These duty counsel lawyers work for and through Canada’s 13 legal aid organizations, which together form the Association of Legal Aid Plans. These organizations want to pay homage and give overdue recognition to duty counsel lawyers — the invisible, essential, unsung heroes of our justice system.

Together, they are declaring October 27, 2021, as national duty counsel day. Please join me today, and this coming October, in thanking our duty counsel lawyers for their passion, expertise, compassion and dedication to access to justice and fairness in our justice system. Thank you.