Privacy Policy

1. Preamble

The purpose of this privacy policy (hereinafter “our policy”) is to help you understand how the Montreal Community Legal Centre (hereinafter “the CCJM”) and our eleven (11) legal aid offices collect, use and process the personal information you provide to us.

By providing us with your personal information, you consent to it being processed in accordance with our policy, and you authorize the CCJM to process it in accordance with the purposes set out below.

You may refuse to provide us with personal information, limit the information you provide us, or withdraw your consent to provide us with personal information at any time. If you do so, we may not be able to provide or assist in providing you with some of our services.

2. Who we are

Since its creation in 1972, the CCJM’s mission has been to provide legal services to the residents of Montreal and Laval, free of charge or with a contribution, to the extent provided by the Act respecting legal aid and the provision of certain other legal services.

Our eleven (11) legal aid offices are located in the following communities:

  • Montreal
  • Laval

3. Why and how do we collect personal information?

When you communicate with us, whether in person, by telephone or through technological means, we may collect and process various types of personal information, notably in the course of the following professional activities:

  • To determine whether you are financially eligible for free or contributory legal aid;
  • To determine whether the legal service for which you are applying for legal aid is a covered service;
  • If you are eligible for legal aid, as the case may be :
    • To assign your file to a permanent lawyer in our employ to provide you with legal services;
      or
    • To entrust your file to a lawyer in private practice of your choice who agrees to provide you with legal services under a legal aid mandate;
  • To establish, maintain or terminate an employment relationship;
  • To establish, maintain or terminate a student or professional internship;
  • To proceed with the recovery of legal aid costs in cases provided for by regulation;
  • To meet our ethical and regulatory obligations, to determine whether we are in a conflict-of-interest situation;
  • To facilitate the use of our Web site, through the use of cookies and other technologies to collect certain personal information about your visit, such as your IP address and other navigational data. To learn more about the cookies we use, we invite you to consult our cookie policy, which forms an integral part of this policy;
  • To deal with any other request concerning you, including a complaint.

We limit the collection of personal information to that which is necessary to perform the functions entrusted to us by the Act respecting legal aid and the provision of certain other legal services, and in accordance with the obligations set out in the Act respecting the Barreau du Québec, the Code of ethics of lawyers and the Regulation respecting accounting and the standards of professional practice for lawyers.

4. What kind of personal information do we collect?

The following personal information may be collected in the course of our business activities described in the previous section:

  • Your personal information, including:
    • Your first and last name;
    • Your date of birth;
    • Your sex at birth or gender identity;
    • Your band number, if you are a First Nations member;
    • Your language of correspondence;
    • Your mailing address;
    • Your e-mail address;
    • Your telephone number;
    • Your social insurance number.
  • Your financial information, including:
    • Your sources of income for the previous or current calendar year;
    • Name(s) and address(es) of your income source(s) and financial institution(s);
    • The status of your assets (real estate, investments, etc.) and liabilities;
    • If necessary, the name and financial information of your spouse and the number of dependent children;
    • Factual information required to establish your legal needs, including, if necessary, nominative information from third parties.

If legal services are rendered to you by a lawyer permanently employed by us, he or she may ask you to provide any additional information he or she deems necessary, depending on the nature and complexity of the mandate entrusted to him or her.

If you apply for a job or an internship, we collect the personal information required to assess the merit of your application and to contact you. The following personal information may be collected in this case:

  • Your personal information as it appears on your résumé and/or cover letter, including information about your education and past work experience;
  • Any additional information deemed necessary for the analysis of your application, including information communicated by third parties regarding your work performance (if you consent to us communicating with them).

5. How do we protect your personal information?

The Act respecting legal aid, and the provision of certain other legal services provides that any communication made by an applicant or recipient of legal aid to one of our staff members has the same confidential character as a communication between a client and a lawyer, and all persons receiving such communications are bound by professional secrecy.

The Act respecting the Barreau du Québec also stipulates that a lawyer must maintain absolute secrecy with regard to confidences received by virtue of his or her profession. Only in exceptional cases, and for serious and grave reasons, is this secrecy lifted. By virtue of their duties and their proximity to your personal information, our non-lawyer staff members are bound by the same obligation of confidentiality.

The personal information we collect is hosted in Canada on secure servers located in our offices or those of our suppliers. However, no Internet transmission method or electronic storage medium is 100% secure. We are committed to meeting our obligations to the best of our ability, but we cannot ensure or warrant the absolute security of any personal information you provide to us by any technological means.

6. Who do we share your personal information with in the course of our activities?

If you are a legal aid applicant or recipient, your personal information will be shared with the Commission des services juridiques as part of its function of ensuring that the activities of Quebec community legal centers, such as the CCJM, comply with the Act respecting legal aid and the provision of certain other legal services and its regulations.

If legal services are rendered to you by a permanent lawyer in our employ, your information may be disclosed to third parties when such disclosure is necessary for the provision of professional services. For example, a lawyer may need to disclose your financial information to the opposing party in a legal action to obtain child support.

Your personal information may be shared with our suppliers, including information technology suppliers, in the course of providing their services. Each of our suppliers has agreed, in writing, to respect the confidentiality of personal information collected in connection with the purposes described in the section “Why and how we collect your personal information”.

Finally, certain personal information may be disclosed in order to comply with a legal requirement, respond to a court order or any other request from a government authority with investigative powers. For example, if one of your lawyers is the subject of a professional inspection by the Quebec Bar, the investigator may require access to certain personal information contained in one of our files.

In all cases, any communication must respect professional secrecy and its exceptions, and be limited to what is strictly necessary in the circumstances.

7. What are your rights regarding your personal information?

Under the Act respecting the protection of personal information in the private sector, you have the following rights with respect to the personal information you provide to us, in certain circumstances:

  • Confirm the existence of your personal information and provide you with a copy, except in the exceptional cases provided for by law;
  • Rectify or update your personal information if it is inaccurate, incomplete or ambiguous;
  • Provide you with computerized personal information in a structured, commonly used technological format;
  • To exercise any of these rights, you must contact us, in writing, as described in the “How to contact us” section.

8. How to contact us?

If you have any questions or comments about our policy, or if you wish to exercise your rights or make a complaint, we invite you to contact our Privacy Officer at the following address:

Me Gilles Trudeau
Montreal Community Legal Centre
600-425 De Maisonneuve Blvd. West,
Montreal, Quebec H3A 3K5
(514) 864-2111
gtrudeau@ccjm.qc.ca

9. How do we keep our privacy policy up to date?

We periodically modify the content of our policy and our Web site to ensure compliance with our obligations, particularly in the event of changes to applicable laws. We therefore encourage you to consult our policy each time you visit our website so that you are aware of the most up-to-date version.