1. Canadian Judicial Council guidelines for judicial decisions SOAR Annual Conference Thursday November 3, Roslyn J. Levine, Q.C. Executive Legal Officer Ontario Superior Court of Justice

2. CJC Privacy considerations
The CJC identifies three issues for consideration for balancing transparency and privacy in court decisions:
1. Personal data – based on fundamental privacy rights
2. Legal prohibitions – based on statutory imperatives
3. Discretionary prohibitions – based on the individual judicial discretion of each s.96 judge, but intended as “exceptional cases”. Properly exercised discretion is concerned with:
Protection (of innocent parties) from harm
Subversion of the course of justice
The Superior Court of Justice in Ontario has adopted the CJC policy as its own policy.

3. CJC guidelines
Privacy interests recommended for protection through the exercise of judicial discretion
Cases where it may be appropriate to exercise discretion to remove personal identifying information. (The focus of these guidelines is innocent “victims”) :
Allegations of sexual assault or exploitation or the sexual, physical or mental abuse of children or adults, re victims’ identity.
The abuse of children subjected to serious physical
or psychological harm.
Beyond any (CFSA) statutory restrictions, contact with child welfare authorities concerning abuse or lack of care, foster care, guardianship, re identity of the family, even where the allegation is unfounded.
Paternity issue: it may be appropriate to protect the identity of the children involved.

4. CJC guidelines cont’d
When a statutory publication prohibition applies, all information that could lead to individuals’ identity should be removed, e.g. community name, acquaintances.
All factual personal information that is unnecessary to the decision should be removed and replaced with generic information, initials, etc.
Judges should balance how much sensitive information is relevant only to the parties and how much needs to be included for the judgment to be properly understood.
The use of fictitious names is endorsed .
Publication restrictions should be flagged upfront for the publishers in a standard way, describing the nature and scope of the restriction.
“Practical obscurity” practices are acknowledged as a means of achieving a balance between transparency and privacy.