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Charged, or someone you know
The licence suspension applies from the roadside and runs before any court date.
Impaired Driving. Understanding Section 320.14
An impaired driving charge moves fast: a roadside suspension, a vehicle impoundment, a licence suspension and a court date, often within a week. Here is what each step means and what can still be argued.
Section 320.19 of the Criminal Code sets a mandatory minimum fine of $1,000 on a first impaired operation offence, 30 days imprisonment on a second, and 120 days on a third or subsequent offence.
Impaired Driving Defence
1000$
Minimum Fine, First Offence
90Days
Administrative Suspension, Ontario
2Hours
Statutory Testing Window
1Year
Minimum Driving Prohibition
Quick Answer
What should I do immediately after being charged with impaired driving in Ontario?
Do not drive: your licence is administratively suspended for 90 days from the roadside. Keep the undertaking, suspension notice and impound papers, and note your first court date. Write down everything you remember about the stop, the demand and your call to a lawyer while it is fresh. Then speak to defence counsel before that first appearance so disclosure can be requested.
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THE OFFENCE
What You Have Actually Been Charged With
Canada's impaired driving law was rewritten in December 2018. The former sections 253 and 254 of the Criminal Code were repealed and replaced by a new Part VIII.1. The charge you are facing is almost certainly under section 320.14, which covers operating a conveyance while impaired to any degree by alcohol, a drug or a combination of both, and separately covers having a blood alcohol concentration of 80 milligrams or more of alcohol in 100 millilitres of blood within two hours after ceasing to operate. Refusing or failing to comply with a demand for a breath or blood sample is a separate offence under section 320.15.
Those are two distinct routes to liability. Impairment is proved by evidence of driving pattern, physical indicia, speech, balance and the officer's observations. The over 80 count is proved by the analysis itself. It is entirely possible to be acquitted of one and convicted of the other, and a person can exceed the legal limit without appearing impaired at all.
A refusal charge carries the same and sometimes greater consequences than the reading it was meant to avoid. Section 320.27(2) also permits mandatory alcohol screening: an officer who is in the lawful execution of their duties and has an approved screening device at hand may demand a sample without first forming a reasonable suspicion. That change has made the lawfulness of the stop itself, rather than the grounds for the demand, a central issue in many files.
CONSEQUENCES
The Criminal Penalty and the Licence
Two separate systems apply at once. The Criminal Code sets the sentence. Ontario's Highway Traffic Act sets the administrative consequences, and those begin immediately at the roadside, long before any court has heard a word of evidence.
Stage
Criminal Code consequence
Ontario administrative consequence
At the roadside
Charge laid; release on an undertaking
Immediate 90-day administrative driver's licence suspension and a seven-day vehicle impoundment
First finding of guilt
Minimum $1,000 fine; driving prohibition of not less than one year
One-year licence suspension, mandatory education or treatment, ignition interlock condition and a licence reinstatement fee
Second finding of guilt
Minimum 30 days imprisonment; prohibition of not less than two years
Three-year licence suspension with a longer interlock period
Third or subsequent
Minimum 120 days imprisonment; prohibition of not less than three years
Lifetime suspension, reducible in defined circumstances
Refusal under section 320.15
Minimum fine of $2,000 on a first offence; same escalating imprisonment minimums
Treated the same as a finding of guilt for over 80
Where the reading is higher, the mandatory minimum fine on a first offence rises with it: $1,000 where the concentration is between 80 and 119 milligrams, $1,500 between 120 and 159 milligrams, and $2,000 at 160 milligrams or more. Bodily harm or death converts the matter into a far more serious indictable offence with substantially higher maximums.
The 90-day suspension is not a punishment for the charge
It is an administrative measure imposed by the province and it takes effect at once, regardless of the eventual outcome in court. It cannot be undone by pleading not guilty, and there is no criminal court application that lifts it. If the charge is later withdrawn or you are acquitted, the suspension does not convert into a conviction-based suspension, but the 90 days already served are not refunded.
HOW THESE CASES ARE DEFENDED
The Issues That Actually Arise
Impaired driving files are technical, and that is an advantage for the defence when the record is examined closely. The recurring questions are these. Was the stop lawful, or was the detention arbitrary contrary to section 9 of the Charter? Was the approved screening device demand made and the sample taken as soon as practicable? Was the accused given their right to counsel under section 10(b) without delay, and were they given a meaningful private opportunity to use it before providing samples or making statements?
Then the science. Was the instrument an approved instrument, operated by a qualified technician? Were the two samples taken at the required interval and did the results agree within the tolerance the Code requires? Were the calibration and system blank checks performed and recorded? Was the demand made within the two-hour window, and if the samples fall outside it, does the Crown have the additional evidence section 320.31(4) requires? Missing maintenance records, uncertified operators and gaps in the certificate are not technicalities invented by defence counsel. They are the statutory preconditions to the presumption of accuracy.
Where a Charter breach is established, section 24(2) may lead to exclusion of the breath results or the statements, applying the framework in R. v. Grant. Where no breach exists, the case may still be defended on impairment itself, on the identity of the driver, on whether the vehicle was being operated at all, or on delay under section 11(b) applying the ceilings from R. v. Jordan.
DRUG-IMPAIRED DRIVING
Cannabis, Prescriptions and Drug Recognition
Section 320.14(1)(c) and the accompanying regulations create prohibited blood drug concentrations, including for tetrahydrocannabinol. A driver may also be charged under section 320.14(1)(a) for impairment by a drug on the ordinary evidence of impairment, and lawfully prescribed medication is no answer to that charge if it in fact impaired the ability to drive.
These files usually involve a standardized field sobriety test at the roadside followed by a drug recognition evaluation at the station. Both are procedures with defined steps, defined conditions and defined documentation. The evaluation is only as reliable as the officer's compliance with it, and the demand for it must itself be lawfully grounded. Blood samples raise their own questions of continuity, timing and analysis.
GETTING BACK ON THE ROAD
Interlock, Education and Reinstatement
Ontario runs a structured process for returning a driver to the road after an impaired driving conviction, and it operates independently of the criminal court. On a first conviction, the licence is suspended for one year, the driver must complete the mandatory education or treatment stream administered under the province's remedial programme, pay the licence reinstatement fee, and drive only with an approved ignition interlock device installed for the required period. The interlock condition appears on the licence itself and driving a vehicle without the device while the condition is in force is a separate offence.
Ontario also offers reduced suspension streams that allow a first-time offender to shorten the period off the road in exchange for earlier interlock installation and completion of the remedial programme. These streams have eligibility criteria and defined deadlines that run from the date of conviction, so they need to be identified before sentencing rather than discovered afterwards. Ask about them at the time the resolution is being discussed.
A separate but equally practical consequence is insurance. Insurers treat an impaired driving conviction as a major conviction and price accordingly for a period of years, and some will decline to renew. That is a private contractual matter and no court order affects it. Knowing the scale of it in advance is part of making an informed decision about how to resolve a charge.
THE PROSECUTION FILE
What Disclosure Should Contain
The Crown's disclosure obligation under R. v. Stinchcombe covers all relevant, non-privileged material in its possession, and in an impaired driving file that is a specific and identifiable list. Counsel should expect the notes of every officer involved, not only the arresting officer; the certificate of the qualified technician; the printouts from the approved instrument including the diagnostic and calibration checks; the alcohol standard certificate; the maintenance and annual inspection records for the instrument; in-car video and any body-worn camera footage; the booking area video; the record of the calls made to counsel and the times; the approved screening device records where a roadside test was administered; and any drug recognition evaluation notes and forms.
Section 320.34 sets out specific disclosure the Crown must make in relation to breath testing, and further material can be sought where the defence shows a reasonable likelihood that it is relevant to an issue. Where video exists but has been lost or overwritten, that itself raises an issue about the adequacy of the Crown's disclosure obligations and can support a remedy.
None of this is hostile to the police or the prosecution. Impaired driving investigations are conducted under time pressure by officers doing a difficult job, and most are done properly. The point of the review is that where Parliament has attached strict statutory conditions to a form of proof, those conditions have to be met, and the only way to know whether they were is to look.
REFUSAL
Failing or Refusing to Provide a Sample
Section 320.15 of the Criminal Code makes it an offence to fail or refuse, without reasonable excuse, to comply with a demand made under Part VIII.1. That covers a roadside screening demand, a demand for breath samples on an approved instrument, a demand for a blood sample, and a demand to submit to a drug recognition evaluation or to perform standardized field sobriety tests. The offence is complete on the refusal itself, and the mandatory minimum fine on a first offence is $2,000, higher than for over 80.
There are genuine defences. A demand that was not lawfully made is not a demand you were obliged to comply with, so the lawfulness of the stop and the grounds for the demand remain in issue. A reasonable excuse can include a medical or respiratory condition that made it physically impossible to provide a suitable sample, and it can include circumstances where the person was not given a meaningful opportunity to exercise the right to counsel under section 10(b) before being required to decide. Confusion about what was being asked can also matter, particularly where the demand was not read clearly or where language was a barrier.
What is not a reasonable excuse is a preference not to provide a sample, a belief that the reading will be unfavourable, or a wish to speak to a lawyer again after having already had that opportunity. The safest course at the roadside is to comply with the demand and to raise every issue afterwards through counsel, where the law provides the proper forum for it.
WHAT TO DO NOW
The First Week Matters Most
1
Do not drive
Driving while suspended is a separate offence under the Highway Traffic Act and makes every later argument harder. Arrange transport and confirm the exact date your suspension ends.
2
Write down what you remember
Times, what you were asked, what you said, when you asked for a lawyer, how long you waited, whether you were alone on the call. Memory for detail fades within days and this record is genuinely useful.
3
Keep every document
The undertaking, the notice of suspension, the impound paperwork and the certificate of analysis if you were served with one. They set out your conditions and your first court date.
4
Retain counsel before the first appearance
Disclosure has to be requested and reviewed before anything can be assessed honestly. Nothing is decided at the first appearance, so there is time, but not an unlimited amount.
Lexaltico LLP acts for drivers charged across Toronto, Peel, York, Halton and Durham. Impaired driving files may be conducted by the firm or referred to experienced criminal defence counsel within our LexKonnect consortium where that better serves the case. Any referral arrangement is disclosed to you in writing and complies with Rule 3.6-6.1 of the Law Society of Ontario's Rules of Professional Conduct. The choice of counsel is governed by your interests and remains yours.
Common Questions
Frequently Asked Questions
What should I do immediately after being charged with impaired driving in Ontario?
Do not drive: your licence is administratively suspended for 90 days from the roadside. Keep the undertaking, suspension notice and impound papers, and note your first court date. Write down everything you remember about the stop, the demand and your call to a lawyer while it is fresh. Then speak to defence counsel before that first appearance so disclosure can be requested.
What is the minimum penalty for a first impaired driving conviction in Canada?
Section 320.19 of the Criminal Code sets a mandatory minimum fine of $1,000 on a first offence, rising to $1,500 where the blood alcohol concentration was 120 to 159 milligrams and $2,000 at 160 or more, or for a refusal. A driving prohibition of at least one year also applies, along with Ontario licence and ignition interlock consequences.
Can I get my licence back before the 90 days are up?
No. The 90-day administrative suspension under the Highway Traffic Act takes effect at the roadside and runs regardless of what happens in criminal court. It is not something a criminal court judge can shorten. It ends on its own date, and reinstatement requires payment of the provincial fee.
Is refusing the breathalyzer better than blowing over?
No. Refusing or failing to comply with a demand is a separate offence under section 320.15 that carries a higher minimum fine on a first offence, $2,000, and the same escalating imprisonment minimums. It also removes the possibility of defending the reading itself. If you have a genuine medical or physical reason you could not provide a sample, tell your lawyer.
What is mandatory alcohol screening?
Under section 320.27(2), an officer who is lawfully carrying out their duties and has an approved screening device at hand may demand a breath sample without first suspecting the driver has alcohol in their body. This applies during lawful traffic stops. The lawfulness of the stop itself remains open to challenge under sections 8 and 9 of the Charter.
Will an impaired driving conviction show on a criminal record check?
Yes. Impaired operation is a Criminal Code offence, so a conviction creates a criminal record that appears on standard police record checks. A discharge is not available because the Code prescribes mandatory minimum penalties for these offences. A record suspension may be sought later under the Criminal Records Act once the waiting period has passed.
How long do impaired driving cases take in the Ontario Court of Justice?
Most are resolved within six to twelve months. Contested trials with Charter applications take longer because they require a formal application record and separate hearing time. R. v. Jordan sets a presumptive ceiling of 18 months from charge to the anticipated end of trial in provincial court.
Does an impaired driving conviction affect travel to the United States?
It can. United States admissibility is decided under American law by border officers, not by Canadian courts, and a single impaired driving conviction can prompt further questioning or a referral. A record suspension in Canada does not bind United States authorities. Anyone who travels frequently should raise this before considering any resolution.
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Using this website, submitting a form, sending an email or speaking to us on the telephone does
not make us your lawyers. That relationship arises only when the firm has
confirmed in writing that it has agreed to act, a conflict search has been completed, and a
retainer has been signed.
Confidentiality of enquiries
Do not send confidential or sensitive information through this website or by email until we have
confirmed in writing that we can act for you. Information sent before that point is
not treated as confidential and may prevent us from acting for you, or for
someone else, in a connected matter.
Response times
We aim to reply within one business day. Contacting us does not guarantee a reply within any
particular period, does not oblige the firm to act, and does not stop, extend or satisfy
any limitation period, filing date or court deadline.
Our telephone line
Our line is answered 24 hours a day, every day of the year. Outside office hours calls are taken
by our intake service, who record your details and pass them to the firm. A lawyer responds during
the next business day, or sooner if the matter is urgent. Answering the telephone is not the same
as giving legal advice, and no relationship arises from that call.
Who we are and how we are regulated
Law Society of Ontario
Lexaltico LLP is regulated by the Law Society of Ontario under the
Law Society Act, R.S.O. 1990, c. L.8. All lawyers practising in
Ontario through the firm are members in good standing.
Law Society of Alberta
Alberta matters are handled by lawyers licensed with, and in good standing with, the
Law Society of Alberta. A lawyer licensed in Ontario is not thereby licensed in
Alberta, and the reverse is also true.
Immigration regulation
Immigration consulting is provided by Regulated Canadian Immigration Consultants
in good standing with the College of Immigration and Citizenship Consultants under the
College of Immigration and Citizenship Consultants Act, S.C. 2019, c. 29,
s. 292.
Lawyers, paralegals and consultants
Not everyone at the firm is a lawyer.
Licensed paralegals in Ontario may act only within the scope the Law Society
permits, which does not include most family, estate or criminal matters.
Immigration consultants are regulated by the College, not by a law society,
and are not lawyers.
Law clerks and managers support files but do not give legal advice.
Each page and biography states which applies. Ask at the outset who will handle your matter and
under which licence.
Languages
We serve clients in thirteen languages. Every page of this website is written and published in
English. Where anything is provided in another language, the English
version governs in the event of a difference. If you need an interpreter, tell us when
you book and we will arrange one.
Fees
The initial assessment
The complimentary 15 minute initial assessment is a brief introductory
conversation. It does not include a review of your documents and does not constitute
legal advice.
The firm charges a fee for substantive consultations, including in civil litigation,
criminal defence and immigration matters. The firm may waive that fee at its discretion.
Any fee is disclosed in advance and credited in full toward your account if you retain the
firm.
Referral fees
Where we refer a matter to another firm, including through LexKonnect, we comply with Rule 3.6-6.1 of the Law Society of Ontario’s Rules of Professional Conduct. Any referral fee is set out in the Law Society’s standard referral agreement, signed by you before the referral proceeds, and no fee is payable to us unless and until the receiving firm has been paid for its work. You are never obliged to accept a referral and are free to retain any firm you choose. No referral arrangement affects the independent professional judgment of any lawyer at this firm.
What is published on this site
Calculators and estimators
They produce estimates from what you type and cannot know the rest. They do not
account for the terms of your contract, statutory exceptions, or the discretion a court will
apply. Do not make a decision on a number produced by a calculator.
Past results
Any outcome described happened on its own facts, before its own decision maker,
under the law as it stood at the time. Past results do not predict or guarantee the result of any
other case.
Reviews and testimonials
Reviews shown here are written by third parties and published on platforms we do not control. Each
describes one person’s experience of one matter. They are not a promise, a
prediction or a guarantee about any other matter.
Links to other websites
This site links to regulators, courts, government sources, professional associations and social
platforms, all operated by others. We do not control them, we are not responsible for
their content or accuracy, and a link is not an endorsement.
Other notices
Limitation periods
Failure to start a proceeding within the applicable limitation period may permanently bar
your claim. In Ontario the general period is two years from discovery
under the Limitations Act, 2002, S.O. 2002, c. 24, Sched. B.
Shorter periods apply to many claims. Seek advice promptly. Nothing on this website extends a
limitation period.
Accessibility
We aim to meet the Accessibility for Ontarians with Disabilities Act
and WCAG 2.1 Level AA. If any part of this site prevents you from reaching us, telephone
+1 416 333 6200 or write to
hello@lexaltico.com and we will provide the information
in another format, at no charge.
