What are the purposes of Class Proceedings Legislation?
The purpose of the Class Proceedings Act and other similar legislation is to help level the legal playing field between big corporations and average people. The three often cited goals of the Act and class actions may be summarized as follows: 1. Access to justice: By allowing people to pool their resources, class actions give people who might not otherwise be able to afford a lawyer their day in court. 2. Judicial economy: By handling a number of individual cases in a single lawsuit, multiple proceedings are avoided saving the judicial system both time and money. 3. Behaviour modification: By allowing people to pool their resources and increasing access to the justice system, corporations are forced to be accountable for harm they have caused and this also serves to force corporations to modify their behaviour and act responsibly so as to avoid being sued.
