While judges don’t like to get involved with a testator’s executor/trustee choice, our estate litigation lawyers know full well that sometimes the only way to administer an estate is to remove the estate trustee, whether it be incompetence, intransigence, or ignorance. In Ontario, anyone with a financial interest in an estate can apply to the court to have an estate trustee removed, replaced, or not appointed at all. Under s.5 and s.37 of the Trustee Act (TA) and Rule 14.05(3)(c) of the Rules of Civil Procedure. The court is guided by Radford v. Radford Estate (2008) and St. Joseph’s Health Centre v. Dzwiekowski (2007) when making these decisions. A request to the court is fact-specific, but the main considerations are the welfare of the beneficiaries, and whether the actions or lack thereof endanger the administration (or value) of the estate or trust.