Lydia’s Law requires the Attorney General to produce an annual progress report tracking how the Ministry has implemented two specific recommendations from the Auditor General’s 2019 report, and to publish that report online. The bill also instructs the Standing Committee on Justice Policy to form a working group to review each progress report and report back to the Legislature.
Beyond reporting, the bill forces operational changes: it directs the Attorney General to review the Victim Quick Response Program within a year, requires police services to inform complainants aged 16 and over about the Independent Legal Advice Program, and bars regulatory bodies from imposing time limits on funding for mental-health supports for people who allege sexual abuse by a regulated person. Those measures create recurring oversight, new notice duties for police, and potentially open-ended funding exposure for regulators.
At a Glance
What It Does
Mandates an annual, public progress report on two named Auditor General recommendations, creates a statutory review role for the Standing Committee on Justice Policy, orders a one-year efficiency review of the Victim Quick Response Program, requires police to notify sexual-assault complainants (16+) about Independent Legal Advice, and prohibits time limits on regulator-funded mental-health supports.
Who It Affects
The Ministry of the Attorney General (reporting and program-review obligations), police services across Ontario (new notice duties), regulatory bodies that fund mental-health supports (potentially open-ended funding obligations), and organizations delivering victim services including Ontario Victim Services.
Why It Matters
The bill turns prior Auditor General recommendations into an ongoing accountability mechanism and links legislative oversight to operational program review. It also shifts practical responsibilities onto police and regulators and could expand the duration of mental-health funding for survivors, with budgetary and administrative consequences.
More articles like this one.
A weekly email with all the latest developments on this topic.
What This Bill Actually Does
The Act creates a formal accountability loop tied to the Auditor General’s 2019 Annual Report: the Attorney General must produce a yearly progress report describing how two specific recommendations from Chapter 3, Volume 3 have been implemented. The bill names the report’s source precisely, requires public posting, and puts a timetable around laying the report before the Legislature.
That transforms what was previously an ad-hoc response into a scheduled, visible metric of Ministry follow-through.
Legislative oversight is built into the bill by requiring the Standing Committee on Justice Policy to establish a working group for each progress report; that working group must begin its review quickly and the Committee must bring its findings to the Assembly. Those deadlines are measured in sitting days, which means review timing will track the parliamentary calendar rather than fixed calendar days.
The idea is to create a short-cycle, politically accountable review that can spotlight gaps in implementation and prompt follow-up questions from legislators.On program and front-line matters, the Act orders a one-year review of the Victim Quick Response Program to evaluate it as a replacement for the Criminal Injuries Compensation Board in supporting survivors of domestic violence, sexual assault and human trafficking. Separately, it imposes a concrete duty on police services: when they receive a sexual-assault complaint from someone aged 16 or older, they must make that person aware of the Independent Legal Advice Program delivered through Ontario Victim Services.
Finally, the Act restricts regulatory bodies from setting deadlines on providing funding for mental-health supports to people who allege sexual abuse by regulated persons—explicitly overriding contrary Acts or regulations so that funding can be provided without a statutory time ceiling.Taken together, the bill stitches transparency, legislative oversight, program review and survivor-oriented protections into a single statute. It does not itself change eligibility rules, funding levels, or program design for the Victim Quick Response Program or regulatory funding schemes; instead it builds processes that are likely to drive future operational and budgetary decisions by exposing gaps and putting those issues on a recurring legislative schedule.
The Five Things You Need to Know
The Attorney General must prepare an annual progress report tracking implementation of Recommendation No. 1 (page 161) and Recommendation No. 3 (page 166) from Chapter 3 of Volume 3 of the Auditor General’s 2019 Annual Report.
Each progress report must be laid before the Legislative Assembly on or before March 1 each year and published on a Government of Ontario website within 10 days after being laid.
The Standing Committee on Justice Policy must form a working group to review each progress report; the working group must start within 10 sitting days of the report being laid and the Committee must report back within 20 sitting days.
The Attorney General must review the efficiency of the Victim Quick Response Program as a replacement for the Criminal Injuries Compensation Board and table that review in the Assembly within one year after the Act comes into force.
Every police service that receives a sexual-assault complaint from a person aged 16 or older must inform that person about the Independent Legal Advice Program, and any regulatory body that funds mental-health supports for alleged victims may not impose time limits on providing that funding.
Section-by-Section Breakdown
Every bill we cover gets an analysis of its key sections.
Definitions and scope
This section anchors the Act to the Auditor General’s 2019 Annual Report and adopts the Community Safety and Policing Act, 2019 definition of ‘police service.’ By fixing the precise report being tracked, the Act limits its reporting obligation to implementation of specific recommendations rather than a general audit of sexual-assault handling across government.
Annual progress report and publication requirements
The Attorney General must prepare the progress report every year describing the Ministry’s progress on two enumerated Auditor General recommendations, lay it before the Assembly by March 1, and publish it online within 10 days of laying. Practically, the Ministry needs systems to collect implementation evidence annually and a publication workflow to meet the narrow publication window.
Committee working group review and reporting deadlines
The Standing Committee on Justice Policy must set up a working group to review each annual progress report. The working group must begin within 10 sitting days and the Committee must report to the Assembly within 20 sitting days of the report being laid. Those statutory sitting-day deadlines create a compressed legislative timetable for scrutiny and require the Committee to prioritize these reviews when reports arrive.
Review of the Victim Quick Response Program (VQRP)
The Attorney General must assess the efficiency of VQRP specifically 'as a replacement for the Criminal Injuries Compensation Board' and report results to the Assembly within one year of the Act coming into force. This mandates a policy evaluation that could inform whether VQRP stays, is restructured, or requires statutory change to fill gaps left by the compensation board model.
Police notice requirement about Independent Legal Advice
Every police service receiving a sexual-assault complaint from someone aged 16 or older must make that person aware of the Independent Legal Advice Program delivered through Ontario Victim Services. The provision creates a routine front-line duty to convey legal-help information, but it does not prescribe form, timing, or record-keeping for the notice, leaving procedural specifics to police policy or secondary guidance.
Regulatory bodies: no time limits on mental-health funding
For any regulatory body that funds mental-health supports for persons alleging sexual abuse by a regulated individual, the Act prohibits imposing time limits on when that funding may be provided—even if another Act or regulation would otherwise impose a limitation. That override creates legal priority for unlimited temporal access to funding under regulator programs and could expand or lengthen financial exposure for regulators.
Commencement and short title
The Act comes into force upon Royal Assent and is cited as Lydia’s Law (Accountability and Transparency in the Handling of Sexual Assault Cases), 2026. Immediate commencement means the one-year review deadline for the VQRP and other timing provisions begin running as soon as the Act receives Royal Assent.
This bill is one of many.
Codify tracks hundreds of bills on this topic across all five countries.
Explore this topic in Codify Search →Who Benefits and Who Bears the Cost
Every bill creates winners and losers. Here's who stands to gain and who bears the cost.
Who Benefits
- Survivors of sexual assault (particularly those 16+): gain clearer notice about available independent legal advice and potential access to regulator-funded mental-health supports without statutory time limits, which may improve access to counsel and therapy.
- Victim-service organizations and Ontario Victim Services: receive statutory backing for the Independent Legal Advice Program and may see increased referrals and demand, strengthening their role in the service ecosystem.
- Advocacy groups and oversight actors: gain an annual, public report and a legislative review mechanism to hold the Ministry to account and to push for remedial action where implementation lags.
- Legislators on the Standing Committee on Justice Policy: acquire a mandated, time-bound review role that elevates sexual-assault handling as a recurring legislative oversight item.
Who Bears the Cost
- Ministry of the Attorney General: must allocate staff and data-collection resources to prepare, publish and defend annual progress reports and to carry out the one-year VQRP review.
- Police services across Ontario: need to implement notice procedures for the Independent Legal Advice Program, train officers/staff, and potentially document compliance, creating administrative burden for local services.
- Regulatory bodies that fund mental-health supports: face indefinite funding exposure because the Act removes statutory time limits, which could increase long-term program costs and actuarial uncertainty.
- Provincial treasury / taxpayers: may face higher or unpredictable expenditures if regulators or victim-support programs increase the duration or volume of funded supports following reviews or increased take-up.
Key Issues
The Core Tension
The central dilemma is between strengthening survivor supports and public accountability versus imposing open-ended administrative and fiscal obligations on ministries, police and regulatory bodies: the Act increases transparency and potential access to services, but does so by creating recurring reporting duties and possible indefinite funding exposures that require new resources and raise implementation and privacy trade-offs.
The bill focuses on process rather than immediate changes to eligibility, benefits or enforcement mechanisms. That design creates two implementation challenges: first, producing meaningful, evidence-based annual progress reports requires data the Ministry may not currently collect in a way that maps to the Auditor General’s recommendations; without new data systems, reporting risks becoming descriptive rather than diagnostic.
Second, the working-group and Committee deadlines are expressed in 'sitting days,' which ties review timing to the legislative calendar; when the Assembly is not sitting, statutory review can be delayed even though publication deadlines are fixed.
The prohibition on time limits for regulator-funded mental-health supports is the most legally disruptive provision. It overrides other Acts or regulations and creates potential open-ended fiscal exposure for regulators; it also leaves unanswered questions about scope (which programs qualify), administrative criteria for continuing funding, and appeal or review mechanisms.
Similarly, the police notice duty lacks prescribed form or record-keeping requirements, opening the door to uneven implementation and disputes about compliance. Finally, publishing progress reports increases transparency but raises privacy and confidentiality considerations—report drafts will need careful redaction practices to avoid revealing case-sensitive information while still providing useful detail for oversight.
There's more to this law than the bill.
Codify Laws traces every connection across the legislative lifecycle.