Understanding the letter of the law While re-offending on bail stirs heated debate, some argue an accused’s level of literacy must become central to the discussion surrounding court orders By: Toni De Guzman Posted: 6:00 AM CST Friday, Nov. 7, 2025

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Several red flags jump off the page when literacy expert Margaret Banasiak examines a Manitoba provincial court bail form.

The black-and-white legal-sized document, which can be up to five pages, is full of lengthy — and often jargony — sentences:

“You are prohibited from seeking, obtaining or continuing any employment, whether or not the position of employment is remunerated, or becoming or being a volunteer in a capacity, that involves being in a trust or authority towards persons under the age of 16 years.”

Or, “You must surrender the things specified in the preceding condition and every authorization, licence and registration certificate relating to these prohibited things, to….”

• See the paperwork (PDF)

As program director at Winnipeg’s Open Doors Adult Literacy Program, Banasiak believes the language used in bail documents — combined with low reading comprehension levels of many accused individuals — is one of the reasons people are frequently breaching the court-ordered conditions that are designed to keep them out of trouble.

“When someone who has a (lower literacy level) sees a document like this, they would get frightened,” Banasiak said. “That would turn them off right away.”

In recent months, issues surrounding bail have been hotly debated by politicians, the public and even the judiciary, fanned by heightened concerns about accused individuals committing crimes while on pre-trial release.

Winnipeg Mayor Scott Gillingham has begun to release bulletins to spotlight habitual bail offenders; provincial court Judge Dale Harvey called the ongoing debate “insulting to judges” and that it chips away at a cornerstone principle — the presumption of innocence; and the Mark Carney government introduced sweeping changes that are designed to make it harder for people accused of certain crimes to get bail.

While high-profile cases involving re-offenders are generating headlines, more problematic issues within the bail system occur at the rudimentary level — 98 per cent of bail violations are breaches of release conditions or a failure to attend court, according to a 2017 Justice Canada study.

As a result, bail breaches account for a quarter of cases in Canadian courts, costing taxpayers $807 million annually, according to a 2018 Department of Justice Canada Research and Statistics report.

For Banasiak, the debate is less about toughening up legislation and more about whether what’s currently in place is adequately serving the accused.

At Open Doors, many people accessing the program have mostly Grade 1 to Grade 6 comprehension levels. According to the Office of the Correctional Investigator of Canada’s 2019-20 annual report, 54 per cent of federal prisoners have less than a Grade 10 education.

“When someone who has a (lower literacy level) sees a document like this, they would get frightened.”

“They’ve been told that they’re dumb, they’re stupid,” Banasiak said. “You’ll never amount to anything, you committed all these crimes, or your life is finished… That puts them down at a very low level. They have to build themselves up to be able to think that they can accomplish stuff.

“A lot of them can’t advocate for themselves. They’re quiet and so they don’t speak up. They don’t ask questions,” she said, adding accused individuals are set up to fail when low literacy skills are combined with bail documents’ stringent wording.

Furthermore, for Indigenous people who are dealing with intergenerational trauma due to the residential school system, the list of commands can be belittling, she said.

“‘You must,’ ‘you must follow,’ that’s very demanding language that’s being used,” Banasiak said. “There’s lots of negativity, so they block it out.”

University of Manitoba criminologist Frank Cormier said there is no doubt the level of literacy can influence how successful an individual will be in meeting their release conditions.

In bail hearings, a judge will read out conditions and ask the accused if they understand. The language utilized is often not accessible to a lot of people, Cormier said, with the conditions sometimes amounting to “a whole laundry list.”

“Very few people have the guts to say, ‘I do not (understand). Could you repeat those please?’ They want to get out of there, so they’ll say ‘yes’ and off they go…,” he said.

“People who are less literate are less able to follow their conditions. Therefore, they’re more likely to be charged with more offences, which then in the future, they are less likely to get bail.”

Offering court documents in Indigenous languages or using more simplified wording that’s tailored to an individual’s comprehension level may help reduce bail infractions, Cormier said.

Marc Kruse, director of Indigenous legal learning and services at the University of Manitoba, said it’s critical the justice system isn’t setting people up to re-offend “just because they can’t read a court document well.” Complicating the issue, however, is cost and service delivery.

“The practical problem is the resources,” said Kruse. “Because even if you speak the language of choice of the person, do you have enough of a legal background to translate and understand the legal document?

“Outside of the Aboriginal court workers, I haven’t seen a long-term sustainable program going yet. In Manitoba, we tend to specifically focus a little more on the English and French, not world or Indigenous languages.”

However, anything that adds clarity would help those in the criminal justice system, he said.

Understanding release conditions is essential to ensuring bail is administered in a fair and appropriate manner, said Manitoba Courts spokeswoman Aimee Fortier. “The court is required to provide service to an accused person who requires translation in order to understand their conditions.”

There are Indigenous translators that can be accessed, Fortier said.

About 10 years ago, officials reviewed wording on court orders “to eliminate legal language and simplify language,” Fortier said.

As an example, officials no longer use the term “recognizance” when referring to bail or release orders and instead favour more simplified wording, said Chris Gamby, lawyer and communications director of the Defence Lawyers Association.

Ultimately, though, accused offenders will decide whether to follow their conditions or not, Gamby said.

“I don’t know if there’s a way to make it nicer language. You’re putting a restriction on someone that is an imposition upon them in a way that is not fun or nice. There’s nothing nice about it,” he said.

“I think a lot of times it’s a choice they make whether or not they’re going to follow a condition.”

Gary Robinson, president of the Legal Aid Lawyers’ Association, said there are factors other than literacy at play.

“I think they understand to a certain extent what the expectations are, what the conditions are,” Robinson said. “But once they’ve been out in community for a while, I think they tend to forget or maybe don’t understand how long these conditions apply for.

“People don’t necessarily keep the paperwork that they’re given, which would, I think, contribute to them, maybe forgetting things over time.”

“I think they understand to a certain extent what the expectations are, what the conditions are.”

Other provinces and territories have had some success with making courts and documents more accessible by offering services in Indigenous languages.

Cree- and Dene-speaking judges travel the northern court circuit in Saskatchewan in an effort to address language barriers. In Nunavut, individuals can have interpretations for bail and court hearings provided in Inuktitut, French or English. Court forms are also available in the three languages.

The issue is critically important with over-representation of Indigenous people in Canadian prisons and jails. In Manitoba, 77 per cent of people in custody are Indigenous.

Work is underway to establish Indigenous court spaces in the province, a Manitoba Courts spokesperson said. Winnipeg, Dauphin and Thompson courts are “currently undergoing physical renovations to include Indigenous spaces,” and are in “various phases of construction.”

Its importance in Manitoba was flagged more than three decades ago, when the Aboriginal Justice Inquiry called for an Indigenous justice system in its final report in 1991.

The province, meanwhile, has begun taking steps on other fronts to ensure Indigenous languages are being represented, including a pilot project involving translating Hansard, the official transcript of Manitoba’s legislative assembly.

As part of the project, the province has recruited two Indigenous language protectors to translate English and French into Anishinaabemowin, which “may involve coining new terms to accurately reflect government discourse,” a cabinet spokesperson said in an email.

While the spokesperson didn’t comment on bail forms specifically, they did say the government is actively exploring translating other documents, such as provincial news releases.

The concerns about literacy come just as the Manitoba government is spending $4.5 million to bolster Indigenous language education.