Law360 Canada (December 3, 2025, 6:07 PM EST) -- In a pay dispute with Ottawa that raises questions about the requirements for judicial independence, the Canadian Superior Courts Judges Association (CSCJA) and the associate judges of the Federal Court separately filed Federal Court applications seeking judicial review of the Carney government’s recent refusal to implement the recommendations of an independent judicial pay commission, including its advice that a $28,000 salary boost (on top of mandatory annual indexing) is necessary to keep attracting outstanding lawyers to the federal benches.
Notably, however, the Canadian Judicial Council (CJC), chaired by Chief Justice of Canada Richard Wagner, did not join in with the CSCJA’s Dec. 3 JR application, even though the two entities made joint submissions, on behalf of the federal judiciary, before the seventh quadrennial Judicial Compensation and Benefits Commission (which makes non-binding recommendations to the federal government every four years).
Prime Minister Mark Carney
Rather, the council, which comprises the 44 chief and associate chief justices of Canada’s federally appointed trial and appellate courts, said it will pursue talks with the Carney government about improving and making “binding” the independent quadrennial process, which is rooted in the constitutional principle of judicial independence, i.e., the need for judges to have sufficient financial security to perform their duties without influence from government, which is the most frequent litigant before the courts.
“The council will not participate in an application for judicial review,” CJC spokesperson Krista Ferraro told Law360 Canada by email. “However it will pursue discussions with the government for a binding process that is fair, effective, and that adheres to the principle of judicial independence.”
For its part, the CSCJA, which counts most of Canada’s 1,195 federally appointed judges as members, said in a statement that the association had to go to court to try to preserve the efficacy and integrity of the existing quadrennial process.
The association’s move today was first reported by Law360 Canada
last month.
The association indicated in a Dec. 3 statement that it “has today reluctantly taken the necessary step” of filing an application for judicial review of the Government of Canada’s decision and reasons rejecting the unanimous recommendations on pay of the 2024 Judicial Compensation and Benefits Commission.
“Allowing such a response to stand would render the commission process meaningless and erode public confidence in the independence of Canada’s courts,” said the association’s statement, quoting the association’s counsel, Jean-Michel Boudreau of Montreal’s IMK LLP.
Jean-Michel Boudreau, IMK LLP
Boudreau noted that “a strong, expert, and independent judiciary is essential to the fair and timely delivery of justice. The Canadian Superior Courts Judges Association is uniquely positioned and has the mandate to protect and promote the principle of judicial independence. Therefore, the CSCJA must act when this constitutional guarantee is undermined.”
Boudreau pointed out that the move “marks the first time in the association’s history that it has sought court intervention to uphold the constitutional framework that protects judicial independence.”
He noted that Supreme Court of Canada jurisprudence makes it clear that, while the federal government is not required to accept the recommendations from the commission, if Ottawa chooses to depart from them, it has a duty to provide legitimate reasons, based on facts and sound reasoning, and the commission’s recommendations should have a meaningful effect.
“Meaningful engagement with the commission’s work is not optional, it is a constitutional obligation,” Boudreau said. “That process only serves its constitutional purpose when governments engage seriously and transparently with the commission’s reasoning and assessment of the evidence.”
“The government’s response does not meet that standard,” Boudreau asserted. “It does not address the commission’s analysis, it is silent on the comprehensive new evidence showing the widening gap between judicial salaries and private sector earnings, and it relies on facts and economic arguments the government did not put before the commission.”
Moreover, he added, the government’s response asserts that judicial salaries are “adequate” without engaging with the commission’s findings to the contrary.
Lola Dandybaeva, a spokesperson with the federal Department of Justice, told Law360 Canada, “After reviewing the commission’s recommendations, and as reflected in the government’s public response, the government decided not to move forward with an additional increase to judicial salaries.”
“Current compensation for judges’ salary and benefits already includes annual indexation and pensions,” she said via email. “Having just received the application, we are currently reviewing it, and it would be inappropriate to comment further at this time.”
In a separate Dec. 3 request for judicial review of the federal government’s Nov. 3 response to the July 11, 2025, report of the 2024 Judicial Compensation and Benefits Commission, the associate judges of the Federal Court asked for a declaration in Federal Court that the government’s response was not supported by reasons that are “rational, legitimate, reasonable, or sufficient to justify departure from the recommendations of the commission” and that “the government has not respected the process set out by the
Judges Act, or achieved its purposes, and has thereby breached the principles of judicial independence.”
The associate judges seek court orders setting aside the decision of the government with respect to judicial salaries and a referral of the matter back to the government “with such directions as this Court may deem just,” as well as an order that the court “remain seized of the issue of the implementation of the remedy imposed.”
Last July, the quadrennial commission
accepted the submission of the Federal Court’s associate judges that their salary should be increased to 95 per cent of the salary of Federal Court judges (up from 80 per cent), to reflect the associate judges’ expanded jurisdiction to conduct trials in cases up to $100,000, as well as the fact that associate judges case-manage “the bulk” of the Federal Court’s burgeoning caseload, including interacting more frequently with self-represented litigants. The then-chief justice of the Federal Court gave evidence to the commission earlier this year, outlining the low number of lawyers applying for the associate judge posts with the court.
After considering hundreds of pages of submissions and evidence provided by the government and the judiciary, the quadrennial commission also recommended that federally appointed judges should get a substantial lump sum salary increase — $28,000 — as their approximately half-a-million-dollar pay package, which is indexed and includes a defined-benefit pension and other benefits, has failed to keep up with the compensation of mutually accepted comparators, including with the income of senior members of the bar in big cities such as Toronto and Vancouver.
“The commission concludes the current judicial salary and benefits are inadequate, and this inadequacy is having an ongoing adverse effect on attracting outstanding candidates to the judiciary,” concluded the 67-page report signed by the quadrennial commission’s chair Anne Giardini, the judiciary’s nominee Douglas Hodson, and Graham Flack, the nominee of the minister of justice.
The commission found that “an increase to the judicial salary is required to ensure outstanding candidates continue to be attracted to the judiciary,” echoing similar warnings by senior judicial leaders over the past few years.
In explaining why it rejected both of the specific salary recommendations made by the commission — and why only the annual statutory indexing of judicial pay was adequate in the circumstances — the federal government cited last month “a significant deterioration in the Canadian financial outlook and a carefully considered difference of perspective on the evidence presented to the commission and how it should be weighed,” stating it “respectfully disagrees with some of the commission’s findings.”
Citing other spending priorities, such as the need to substantially boost defence spending, the government said that “recent developments … militate strongly in favour of Canada only incurring new fiscal obligations necessary to uphold and safeguard Canadian sovereignty.”
“While this includes safeguarding the critical public institutions that underpin Canadian democracy,” Ottawa said, “the government is of the view that, based on the evidence before this commission, judicial salaries are adequate and, in any event, cannot be the source of new fiscal expenditure at a time of comprehensive expenditure review, including possible public sector job losses.”
As of April 1, 2025 (i.e., without the recommended raise), a puisne federal judge’s annual salary stands at $414,900 (not including the value of the judicial annuity or disability benefits).
If the raise recommended by the commission were to be implemented, federally appointed judges’ salaries, retroactive to April 1, 2024, would be:
- Supreme Court of Canada: chief justice $546,100; puisne judges $505,700;
- Federal Court of Appeal, Federal Court, Tax Court and Court Martial Appeal Court: chief justices $465,700; associate chief justices $465,700; puisne judges $424,700;
- Provincial and Territorial Courts of Appeal and Superior Courts: chief justices $465,700; senior associate chief justices $465,700; associate chief justices $465,700; puisne judges $424,700.
The three-person quadrennial commission — composed of a nominee of the government, a nominee of the judiciary and a jointly nominated chairperson, is an independent body established every four years under the federal
Judges Act to review and make recommendations to the federal minister of justice on the adequacy of the salaries and benefits of federally appointed judges and associate judges.
The Supreme Court’s landmark decision in the
P.E.I. Judges Reference, [1997] 3 S.C.R. 3, held that judicial independence prohibits negotiations over pay and benefits between the judiciary and other branches of government; requires that judicial pay does not fall below an as-yet undefined constitutional minimum; and requires regular review of the adequacy of judicial compensation by an “independent, objective and effective commission.”
The commission must consider any proposed changes to judicial compensation before they are implemented.
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