# Reference — Ontario's training requirements for family arbitrators

**Why this file exists.** `AGENTS.md` §4 Offerings rests on a proposition about
what Ontario law does and does not gate. R14: *anything a spec makes a claim
about must be reachable from the repository* — a claim whose source lives only
at a URL is one a reviewer can be asked to trust rather than check. This is the
extract, with its provenance and the command that produced it.

It is **not** legal advice and it is not a substitute for the instruments
themselves. It records what one government page said on one day.

---

## Provenance

| | |
|---|---|
| Source | `https://www.ontario.ca/page/training-family-arbitrators` |
| Retrieved | **2026-08-27** |
| Method | `WebFetch` — page converted to markdown, then queried for verbatim requirements, hour figures, the lawyer / non-lawyer distinction, ongoing-training period, and every statute or regulation named |
| Retrieved by | Claude Code, on Pouya's instruction of 2026-08-27 (Q39) |
| Cited by Pouya | Yes — this is the source named in his Q39 ruling, with the same three hour figures |

**Re-derive it:** fetch the URL and read it. If the page has changed, record the
change here rather than editing the extract — a stale extract with a date is
useful; a silently updated one is not.

---

## What the page states

Quoted as retrieved. Where the page's own wording is reproduced it is in
quotation marks.

**Screening for domestic violence and power imbalances.** "at least 14 hours
(within one week) to learn about screening parties for domestic violence and
power imbalances".

**Ontario family law — non-lawyers only.** "All family law arbitrators who are
not a part of the Ontario Bar, or another Canadian bar, must complete 30 hours
of training about Ontario family law." The page adds that "You do not need to
complete this training all at once."

**Members of the Ontario Bar.** No hour figure. The page states instead that
"you should ensure you are familiar with family law to fulfil your professional
obligation to provide services competently."

**Ongoing training.** "10 hours over any two-year period. Five of these hours
must be related to domestic violence or power imbalance issues".

**Statute named on the page.** *Arbitration Act, 1991*. **No section number and
no regulation (`O. Reg.`) number appears on the page.**

---

## What the page does NOT state — and this half matters more

**It says nothing about commercial arbitration.** Commercial arbitration is
neither mentioned nor excluded. The page does not state which arbitrations the
requirements apply to beyond describing them as family arbitration.

So the source establishes the **family** half of §4's scoped proposition
directly, and the **commercial** half only by *absence* — a page about family
arbitrators is not authority for what commercial arbitrators need. §4 records
the commercial half as **Pouya's stated position**, attributed to him and
deliberately unstamped, for exactly that reason.

**Nothing on the site turns on the gated activity.** Pouya has confirmed he does
not accept family arbitration under the *Family Law Act* (§4 Offerings, scope
exclusion). The requirements above are recorded because the register reasoned
from a false universal for a day and must not do so again — not because the
practice sits anywhere near them.

**Do not upgrade this file into an authority it is not.** If a stronger source
is ever wanted — the *Family Law Act* provisions and the regulation made under
it — fetch and extract those, name them by number, and date them. Do not write
a section number from memory.