Courts that Have Tried Binding Judicial Dispute Resolution On May 14, 2021, a pilot was started to test whether a new type of dispute resolution would help people in a family law court dispute, while at the same time clearing the backlog in the courts. Binding Judicial Dispute Resolution (Binding JDR) was started in Simcoe and Muskoka. In March 2022, it was extended to Peterborough, Lindsay and Cobourg. It has also since been extended to Kitchener-Waterloo. In the pilot, both sides had to voluntarily agree to take this path toward a settlement or judicial decision in their case - instead of following the regular procedure. Binding JDR is a hybrid animal with certain features of a settlement conference and elements of a trial. Photo credit: Sora Shimazaki What is a Settlement Conference? To recap my previous post , a settlement conference is an informal hearing that allows both sides to get an opinion from a judge as to how he or she would decide the case if it were at trial. ...
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