Ontario. Weekly Courts

• Weekly Courts

• Ontario. Single Courts

• Ontario. Practice Courts

• Ontario. Motions Courts

Since 1837, individual Justices of the superior courts (and later Masters) have been able to hear motions about a wide range of procedural matters in criminal and civil cases. The name of these motion hearings has changed over time from Practice Court (c. 1837-1881) to Single Court (c. 1881-1894) to Weekly Court (c. 1894 to present). The volume of motions made in York County required that the Court sit every day and thus came to be locally known as Motions Court. In 1895, Weekly Courts were established in London and Ottawa.

The Weekly Courts, presided over by individual justices of the superior courts, have jurisdiction to hear motions concerning a wide range of procedural matters in civil and criminal cases. As these courts tended to sit once a week, they became known as Weekly Courts.

Ontario Judicature Act, Statutes of Ontario 1881, Chap. 5

RAD: Rules for Archival Description, 2nd edn (2008)

2026-11-16: migrated to AtoM

Banks, Margaret A. Evolution of the Ontario Courts, 1788-1981 (1983)

Form of name used in heading not found in Canadiana Name Authorities, 1996-12-24. "Ontario. Practice Court", however, is found, but is used as a variant form of name since the term "Weekly Court" is the more recent, and longer-lived term.

Archivist(s):
T. Belton, R. Anger