Program directory · Department of Justice Canada
Litigation Services
- Department
- Department of Justice Canada
- Program code
- BNX01 (JUS)
- Core responsibility
- Legal Services
- In Departmental Plans
- 2018-19 – 2026-27 · New since an earlier plan
What it does
Litigation services are integral to Justice Canada’s role in supporting the Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada as Government’s chief law officer and as the officer responsible for the conduct of all litigation on behalf of the Crown. Under this program, legal professionals provide high quality bilingual and bijural litigation services to the federal government. They work with their colleagues across Justice to ensure the coherence and coordination of litigation, advisory, legislative, and policy services in specific legal areas. Litigation services assist the Government in achieving its objectives in accordance with the law and in ensuring that it meets its obligations under the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, and other constitutional and international obligations. This includes providing litigation services before all courts and before administrative and inquiry bodies, domestically and internationally. It also includes representing the federal government in the resolution of litigious or potentially litigious matters, using appropriate dispute prevention and resolution methods to promote early settlement, gathering and challenging evidence in accordance with applicable rules of evidence, and developing legal positions and making submissions in order to preserve the interests of client departments and agencies and those of the federal government as a whole.
Source: the department's Program Inventory, via GC InfoBase.
History and lineage
First appears in GC InfoBase's actual spending by program in 2018-19. The data does not record when a program was created; it may be older than its first appearance here, which is limited by the sources (program spending starts in 2010-11, Departmental Plans in 2018-19).
| Program | Relation | Years with data | Actual spending over those years |
|---|---|---|---|
| Litigation Services | This program | 2018-19 – 2028-29 | $792M |
No earlier or later program in the same department has a similar name.
Significant changes in scope and budget
Detected from the data: renames between plans, programs it appears to replace, merge with or split into (matched by name), year-over-year changes in spending of at least 25% and $5M, or in employees of at least 20% and 25 FTEs, linked budget measures, and results indicators added or dropped.
| Year | What changed | Source |
|---|---|---|
| 2022-23 | Indicators added: Client satisfaction mean rating on the overall quality of litigation services; Client satisfaction mean rating on the responsiveness of litigation services; Client satisfaction mean rating on the timeliness of litigation services; Client satisfaction mean rating on the usefulness of litigation services | Departmental Results Framework (GC InfoBase) |
| 2022-23 | Indicators dropped: Client satisfaction mean rating of 8.0 (or greater) on a 10-point scale on the overall quality of legal services.; Client satisfaction mean rating of 8.0 (or greater) on a 10-point scale on the performance of legal services against the Service Standards for the Provision of Legal Services in Government. | Departmental Results Framework (GC InfoBase) |
| 2024-25 | Spending $169M, against $100M in 2023-24 (+69%). | Actual spending (GC InfoBase) |
Success criteria
The program's indicators from its department's Departmental Results Framework: the target set in each year's plan, and the result reported the following year. Source: GC InfoBase.
Historical: targets against results
Bars: result reported. Dashed line: target.
| Report year | Target | Due | Result | Status |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2022-23 | ≥ 8 | 2023 | 8.5 | Met |
| 2023-24 | ≥ 8 | 2024 | 8.6 The 2023–24 result reflects interim feedback collected during Cycle V of the Client Feedback Survey. | Met |
| 2024-25 | ≥ 8 | 2025 | 8.5 The 2024–25 result reflects final feedback collected during Cycle V of the Client Feedback Survey. | Met |
Bars: result reported. Dashed line: target.
| Report year | Target | Due | Result | Status |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2022-23 | ≥ 8 | 2023 | 8.8 | Met |
| 2023-24 | ≥ 8 | 2024 | 8.2 The 2023–24 result reflects interim feedback collected during Cycle V of the Client Feedback Survey. | Met |
| 2024-25 | ≥ 8 | 2025 | 8.2 The 2024–25 result reflects final feedback collected during Cycle V of the Client Feedback Survey. | Met |
Bars: result reported. Dashed line: target.
| Report year | Target | Due | Result | Status |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2022-23 | ≥ 8 | 2023 | 8.5 | Met |
| 2023-24 | ≥ 8 | 2024 | 8.6 The 2023–24 result reflects interim feedback collected during Cycle V of the Client Feedback Survey. | Met |
| 2024-25 | ≥ 8 | 2025 | 8.5 The 2024–25 result reflects final feedback collected during Cycle V of the Client Feedback Survey. | Met |
Bars: result reported. Dashed line: target.
| Report year | Target | Due | Result | Status |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2022-23 | ≥ 8 | 2023 | 8.6 | Met |
| 2023-24 | ≥ 8 | 2024 | 8.7 The 2023–24 result reflects interim feedback collected during Cycle V of the Client Feedback Survey. | Met |
| 2024-25 | ≥ 8 | 2025 | 8.6 The 2024–25 result reflects final feedback collected during Cycle V of the Client Feedback Survey. | Met |
Bars: result reported. Dashed line: target.
| Report year | Target | Due | Result | Status |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2018-19 | ≥ 70% | 2019 | 80% | Met |
| 2019-20 | ≥ 70% | 2020 | 85% A minimum of 70% resolved litigation files in a fiscal year have a successful outcome (settled or adjudicated) from the Crown's perspective. | Met |
| 2020-21 | ≥ 75% | 2021 | 92% A minimum of 75% resolved litigation files in a fiscal year have a successful outcome (settled or adjudicated) from the Crown's perspective. In terms of the percentage of litigation files successfully resolved from a Government of Canada perspective, 92% is higher than the typical success rate. Due to impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic and several court closures throughout the reporting period, 58%… | Met |
| 2021-22 | ≥ 75% | 2022 | 92% The percentage of litigation files successfully resolved from a Government of Canada perspective remained the same as last year at 92%. | Met |
| 2022-23 | ≥ 75% | 2023 | 90% | Met |
| 2023-24 | ≥ 75% | 2024 | 93% | Met |
| 2024-25 | ≥ 75% | 2025 | 92% | Met |
Bars: result reported. Dashed line: target.
| Report year | Target | Due | Result | Status |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2019-20 | ≥ 8 | 2020 | 8.4 The results from the Client Feedback Survey show that the Department exceeded the target of 8.0 in 2019-20. Advisory: 8.5; Litigation: 8.4; Legislative: 8.6; Regulatory: 8.4 | Met |
| 2020-21 | ≥ 8 | 2020 | 8.4 The result presented for 2020-21 reflects interim feedback collected during Cycle IV of the Department of Justice Canada Legal Services Client Feedback Survey and shows that the Department exceeded the target of 8.0. | Met |
| 2021-22 | ≥ 8 | 2022 | 8.6 The result presented for 2020-21 reflects interim feedback collected during Cycle IV of the Department of Justice Canada Legal Services Client Feedback Survey and shows that the Department exceeded the target of 8.0. | Met |
Bars: result reported. Dashed line: target.
| Report year | Target | Due | Result | Status |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2019-20 | ≥ 8 | 2020 | 8.4 The result shown is the average of the performance standards ratings for the legal services provided by the Department of Justice Canada. The ratings are the following: Responsiveness/Accessibility: 8.7; Usefulness: 8.4; Timeliness: 8.2. The results from the Client Feedback Survey show that the Department exceeded the target of 8.0 in 2019-20. | Met |
| 2020-21 | ≥ 8 | 2020 | 8.7 Results presented in previous Departmental Results Reports for the performance of legal services against the service standards were disaggregated by service dimension (responsiveness/accessibility, usefulness, and timeliness). These results have since been aggregated into a single indicator for the performance of legal services against service standards. In doing so, a weighting strategy was appl… | Met |
| 2021-22 | ≥ 8 | 2022 | 8.8 The result presented for 2021-22 reflects interim feedback collected during Cycle IV of the Department of Justice Canada Legal Services Client Feedback Survey and shows that the Department exceeded the target of 8.0. A weighting strategy was applied to ensure accurate representation of client feedback. The disaggregated ratings are the following: Responsiveness/Accessibility: 9.0; Usefulness: 8.8… | Met |
Current: the 2026-27 plan's targets
Bars: result reported. Dashed line: target.
| Report year | Target | Due | Result | Status |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2026-27 | ≥ 8 | 2027 | — | Planned |
Bars: result reported. Dashed line: target.
| Report year | Target | Due | Result | Status |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2026-27 | ≥ 8 | 2027 | — | Planned |
Bars: result reported. Dashed line: target.
| Report year | Target | Due | Result | Status |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2026-27 | ≥ 8 | 2027 | — | Planned |
Bars: result reported. Dashed line: target.
| Report year | Target | Due | Result | Status |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2026-27 | ≥ 8 | 2027 | — | Planned |
Bars: result reported. Dashed line: target.
| Report year | Target | Due | Result | Status |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2026-27 | ≥ 85% | 2027 | — | Planned |
Future goals: targets due after 2026-27
No targets with a later due date.
Spending and employees: planned against actual
Spending
Show the numbers
| Fiscal year | Planned | Actual |
|---|---|---|
| 2018-19 | $84.9M | $118M |
| 2019-20 | $89.6M | $108M |
| 2020-21 | $93.3M | $114M |
| 2021-22 | $96.6M | $102M |
| 2022-23 | $96.1M | $81.4M |
| 2023-24 | $103M | $100M |
| 2024-25 | $103M | $169M |
| 2025-26 | $128M | — |
| 2026-27 | $125M | — |
| 2027-28 | $123M* | — |
| 2028-29 | $121M* | — |
Employees (FTEs)
Show the numbers
| Fiscal year | Planned | Actual |
|---|---|---|
| 2018-19 | 1,321 | 1,740 |
| 2019-20 | 1,739 | 1,812 |
| 2020-21 | 1,804 | 1,844 |
| 2021-22 | 1,850 | 1,892 |
| 2022-23 | 1,930 | 2,021 |
| 2023-24 | 1,962 | 2,188 |
| 2024-25 | 2,200 | 2,300 |
| 2025-26 | 2,295 | — |
| 2026-27 | 2,202 | — |
| 2027-28 | 2,179* | — |
| 2028-29 | 2,163* | — |
Planned spending, plan by plan
Each row is one year's Departmental Plan and its forecast for the next three fiscal years; read a column down to see how the forecast for one year changed. The last row is what was actually spent. Click an amount for its source. Biggest changes in federal spending plans
| Plan | 2018-19 | 2019-20 | 2020-21 | 2021-22 | 2022-23 | 2023-24 | 2024-25 | 2025-26 | 2026-27 | 2027-28 | 2028-29 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2018-19 plan | $84,912,264 | $84,912,264 | $84,929,876 | ||||||||
| 2019-20 plan | $89,648,290 | $89,665,902 | $89,665,902 | ||||||||
| 2020-21 plan | $93,306,211 | $94,580,899 | $95,323,566 | ||||||||
| 2021-22 plan | $96,603,075 | $97,287,428 | $97,287,428 | ||||||||
| 2022-23 plan | $96,142,280 | $96,142,280 | $96,142,280 | ||||||||
| 2023-24 plan | $103,240,830 | $103,240,830 | $103,240,830 | ||||||||
| 2024-25 plan | $103,368,751 | $94,593,381 | $93,805,421 | ||||||||
| 2025-26 plan | $128,240,033 | $127,637,078 | $127,605,412 | ||||||||
| 2026-27 plan | $125,120,692 | $123,111,679 | $120,504,865 | ||||||||
| Actual | $118,262,419 | $107,647,216 | $114,195,078 | $101,540,177 | $81,419,947 | $100,117,777 | $168,709,104 |
Actual spending is from Departmental Results Reports and the Public Accounts, as published in GC InfoBase. FTEs are full-time equivalents.
