(Hamilton, January. 22, 2025) – Yesterday, in partnership with the Community Legal Clinic of York Region, the Hamilton Community Legal Clinic filed an appeal of the Dec. 23, 2024, decision of the Superior Court of Justice to dismiss the Application of 14 individuals who have experienced encampment evictions from public property.
The appeal was filed on behalf of the 14 individuals. We maintain that the evictions violated the 14 individuals’ right to life, liberty and security under Section 7 of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms. They further violated the Applicants’ equality rights under Section 15 of the Charter, because the evictions had a disproportionate impact on women, people with disabilities, and Indigenous peoples.
Our legal team has undertaken a comprehensive review of the Court’s 15-page decision and found there to be many areas of profound concern that warrant an appeal and consideration by the Ontario Court of Appeal. These include the issue of whether individuals were evicted overnight, an adequate analysis of Charter arguments, and the acknowledgement of the disproportionate impact of evictions on women, people with disabilities and Indigenous peoples.
The Hamilton Community Legal Clinic will make the full appeal document open to the public here on our website once the Ontario Court of Appeal provides a copy issued by the Court.
While we cannot comment in detail on the appeal while it is before the Court, it is important to recognize why the appeal was necessary.
Encampments have become an increasingly common sight as communities across Ontario grapple with rising homelessness. The affordable housing crisis, skyrocketing rents, stagnant social assistance rates, and increased cost of living are all putting unprecedented pressures on our communities. Homelessness has become a crisis to which our shelter system cannot keep pace, and shelters have operated at or over capacity for years. The question then becomes: if people can’t afford rent, and the shelters are full, where do they go?
Systemic change and action from all levels of government is needed to address the shortage of affordable housing, the need for supportive and/or transitional housing, mental health and addiction resource gaps, increased shelter capacity and accessible shelter spaces. Encampments in parks are not the solution. How we respond to the issue of homeless encampments is a critical step in creating change that supports everyone in our community.
Court decisions play an important role in that process when they rule on what municipalities can and cannot do to stay within legal and constitutional boundaries to address encampments. When an error is made in that decision, an appeal is the next step, a necessary check point to ensure court decisions are right by law. In this circumstance, it’s a necessary next step in supporting how we address homelessness in our community.
Finding solutions to homeless encampments in our city parks requires compassion and respecting the rights of all – parents and children playing in parks, the housed, and the unhoused. Legal clinics across Ontario are mandated to ensure access to justice for individuals and families living at or below the poverty line, whose circumstances have legal merit to be addressed. Everyone has a right to feel safe; and everyone has a right to a cover over their head in the rain, the snow and the cold.
These 14 individuals also have a right to the appeal process.
We will provide updates as the litigation unfolds, including approximate timelines. We are hopeful that the appeal will be heard in the fall of 2025.
