A researcher is looking for raw data for criminal justice spending from 198? - present. We are have been able to find: POLICE - Table 254-0003 : Trends in police personnel and expenditures for Canada, provinces and territories, annual, ADULT CORRECTIONAL SERVICES - Table 251-0007 : Operating expenditures for provincial, territorial and federal programs 1978/1979 - 2008/2009, and also LEGAL AID - Table 258-0002 - Legal aid plan expenditures, by type of expenditure, but are having trouble finding COURT(S) expenditures and don't seem to be making any headway. This issue of Juristat has great looking info, but it is OLD, i.e. 1997 -- Justice Spending in Canada Stats Can 85-002 (vol. 19, #12). We Have tried Public Accounts and the Annual Report of the Ministry of Justice.
According to a StatsCan Summary Table: "Courts Personnel and Expenditure Survey and the Prosecutions Personnel and Expenditure Survey have been discontinued. 2002-2003 represents the last available data for these surveys. Both surveys are biennial surveys, therefore, figures are not available immediately preceding and following the reference period." I think current numbers will be very large given that in the Juristat vol. 22, no. 11 issue of 2002,, the figure quotes Expenditures on courts to just over $1 billion in 2000/01.Total court spending increased 4% since 1998/99 (the last year for which courts data were available).
Is there anywhere else that I could find information on court spending?
Answer
Try the Expenditure Analysis of Criminal Justice in Canada <http://www.pbo-dpb.gc.ca/files/files/Crime_Cost_EN.pdf>
Court expenditures pertaining to federal courts is mandated by Courts Administration Service Act which came into force in July 2003 (passed by Parliament in 2002) and covers the Federal Court of Appeal, the Federal Court, the Court Martial Appeal Court of Canada and the Tax Court of Canada. Annual reports covering the time period 2005/2006 to present can found at <http://cas-ncr-nter03.cas-satj.gc.ca/portal/page/portal/CAS/RPP_eng>. There are also some early reports by individual court for earlier timeframe on this site. The information is presented at a very high level without any major breakdown in specific areas of expenditure. But the links on the web page lead to the Treasury Board of Canada Secretariat web page where are more granular breakdowns of the expenditures data for the time period 2006/2007 to present see <http://www.tbs-sct.gc.ca/rpp/2006-2007/cas-satj/cas-satjtb-eng.asp> can be found.
Supreme Court of Canada Financial Statements covering the time period 2007/2008 to present can be found at <http://www.scc-csc.gc.ca/about-apropos/rep-rap/fin/index-eng.aspx>
One of the issues is that most of these Financial Statement indicate that they are “Unaudited.”
There are also Departmental Performance Reports, for example: <http://cas-ncr-nter03.cas-satj.gc.ca/portal/page/portal/CAS/DPR-RMR_eng/dpr-rmr-2012-2013_eng>
I assume that there are earlier Financial Statements but I have never invested the time to track them down. My gut feeling is that the Courts Administration Service Act was brought in to try and resolve a problem with financial reporting in the courts. So financial information pre-Courts Administration Service Act may be more involved (aka difficult) to find.
