Official Languages Act

Marginal note:Duty to ensure understanding without an interpreter

• 16 (1) Every federal court, other than the Supreme Court of Canada, has the duty to ensure that

  • (a) if English is the language chosen by the parties for proceedings conducted before it in any particular case, every judge or other officer who hears those proceedings is able to understand English without the assistance of an interpreter;

  • (b) if French is the language chosen by the parties for proceedings conducted before it in any particular case, every judge or other officer who hears those proceedings is able to understand French without the assistance of an interpreter; and

  • (c) if both English and French are the languages chosen by the parties for proceedings conducted before it in any particular case, every judge or other officer who hears those proceedings is able to understand both languages without the assistance of an interpreter.

• Marginal note:Adjudicative functions

  (2) For greater certainty, subsection (1) applies to a federal court only in relation to its adjudicative functions.

• Marginal note:Limitation

  (3) No federal court, other than the Federal Court of Appeal, the Federal Court or the Tax Court of Canada, is required to comply with subsection (1) until five years after that subsection comes into force.