Overview

• The Ontario government has tabled legislation to implement a pool-based recommendation process for judicial appointments, aiming to expedite the selection process.
• Seventeen new judges will be added to the province's lower courts to address growing case backlogs and increasingly complex criminal cases.
• A specialized prosecution team focused on cybercrime and cryptocurrency-related offenses will be established as part of the reforms.
• The changes are positioned as part of Ontario’s broader tough-on-crime agenda, with a focus on keeping violent repeat offenders incarcerated.
• Premier Doug Ford and Attorney General Doug Downey have linked the reforms to criticisms of federal bail policies, which they claim contribute to violent crime in the province.