What is the difference between legal Information and legal advice?
You can provide legal information to your clients, but you should not provide any legal advice. Legal advice can only be provided by licensed legal service providers, such as lawyers and paralegals.
Legal Information includes:
- Helping a client find legal services, resources or advice
- Helping determine possible steps a client can take to begin solving a legal problem
- Providing general information about a client’s rights and responsibilities under the law but does not include providing answers to your client’s specific legal circumstances or legal issues. It also does not include determining whether or how the law applies to your client’s issue(s) or circumstances.
Legal Advice includes:
- Interpreting and applying the law to a specific situation or circumstances
- Making an assessment about whether and how the law applies to a specific situation and whether your client is entitled to a legal remedy
- Giving a specific recommendation on what your client should legally do in a situation
For example, if your client’s rent has been increased:
- Giving legal Information could mean providing your client with general information about rent increases in Ontario.
- Giving legal advice would be advising your client that the amount their landlord raised their rent this year is illegal under Ontario’s Rent Increase Guideline.
Another example could be a client receiving income support from Ontario Works who has gone into custody:
- Giving legal information could mean explaining to your client that they might experience issues with receiving their income support while in custody
- Giving legal advice would be telling your client that they still qualify for Ontario Works because they are only serving a short sentence in custody.
More information on providing basic information about legal rights and procedures to your clients can be found here.
