France now has a law against after-hours emails to employees. Does this make sense to you? Could you get your work done on this basis? Is that question your concern, or is it up to the employer to organize your time more effectively?

Can such a law apply to professionals or others who do not punch a clock?

Are the benefits worth the inconvenience … given that the benefits go to the employees and the inconvenience to the employers, to a large extent.

When France legislated its 35-hour week, over 15 years ago, one consequence was that people had a . . . [more]

It’s that time of year again – articling students in Manitoba are wrapping up their year and looking ahead to their Call to the Bar and beginning their careers as lawyers. Some will continue to practice in the firms where they received their articles, while others will move to new firms or set out on their own. Regardless the setting, all will need to develop good practice and time management habits.

I’ve spoken with articling students in the past about the relevance of learning time management techniques at a point in their career when they have so little control over . . . [more]

A study of Harvard graduates showed that a person’s approach to setbacks in life is the single greatest predictor of success. This is interesting considering that companies tend to hire based on technical skill and intelligence. However, only 25% of job success is attributed to intelligence and technical skills. Psychologist Shawn Achor states that:

Seventy-five percent of long-term job success is predicted not by intelligence and technical skills, which is normally how we hire, educate, and train, but it’s predicted by three other umbrella categories. It’s optimism (which is the belief that your behaviour matters in the midst of challenge),

We have smartphones and smart cars are on the way, so we should not be surprised that SmartLaw gets added to the tags of BigLaw/SmallLaw, NewLaw/OldLaw, NextLaw and even LessLaw etc. But, like so much of the legal world, the “bleedingly obvious” can take a while to be noticed. While I have talked about smarter lawyers in relation to our Lawyers Workstation approach to IT, Ryan McClead’s blog article “SmartLaw: The firm of the future” was interesting due to its emphasis on the firm, rather than the lawyer.

“Smart” is a neat word: it includes connotations of style, . . . [more]

Each Wednesday we tell you which three English-language cases and which French-language case have been the most viewed* on CanLII and we give you a small sense of what the cases are about.

For this last week:

1. Canada (Attorney General) v E.F., 2016 ABCA 155

[28] Canada acknowledges that nowhere in paragraph 127 is there a reference, express or otherwise, to the “illness, condition or disability” of the applicant being terminal, nor to the applicant being at or near the end of life. A legislative background document published by the Canadian government and provided to the court by . . . [more]

Here are excerpts from the most recent tips on SlawTips, the site that each week offers up useful advice, short and to the point, on research and writing, practice, and technology.

Research & Writing

Clarify the Question
Susannah Tredwell

Summer students have just started at my firm. One of the things that we emphasize in training is that if they don’t understand what they have been asked to do, they need to go back to the lawyer and clarify the question. While it may be embarrassing to have to go back and ask, it’s far better than discovering that . . . [more]

Each Monday we present brief excerpts of recent posts from five of Canada’s award­-winning legal blogs chosen at random* from seventy recent Clawbie winners. In this way we hope to promote their work, with their permission, to as wide an audience as possible.

This week the randomly selected blogs are 1. Double Aspect  2. Clio Blog 3. AvoidAClaim  4. National Self-Represented Litigants Project Blog  5. Thoughtful Legal Management

Double Aspect
A Third View on Legislating Two Languages at the SCC

In the last number of days, Professor Grammond and incoming AUT Law School lecturer (and my very generous blogging host) . . . [more]

Following the extension to develop assisted dying legislation, provincial courts have scrambled to meet the special exemptions created by the courts.

The first provincial application under this exemption was Re HS in February 2016, where the motion judge described her role in such an application,

[51] … The role of this Court is limited to applying or authorizing an existing constitutional exemption and determining whether a particular person qualifies for that exemption…

The process for doing so would be to apply the criteria enunciated by the Court in the 2015 Carter decision at para 127 to a a . . . [more]

One Sunday each month OnPoint Legal Research provides Slaw with an extended summary of, and counsel’s commentary on, an important case from the British Columbia, Alberta, or Ontario court of appeal.

Schrenk v. British Columbia (Human Rights Tribunal), 2016 BCCA 146

AREAS OF LAW: Human rights; Employment; Derogatory statements; “Condition of employment”

~Insults inflicted upon employees in the workplace, even in the course of their employment, only fall under s. 13 of the Human Rights Code if the wrongdoer has sufficient employer-given power to impose the unwelcome conduct as a condition of employment, or if the conduct is tolerated . . . [more]

Every week we present the summary of a decision handed down by a Québec court provided to us by SOQUIJ and considered to be of interest to our readers throughout Canada. SOQUIJ is attached to the Québec Department of Justice and collects, analyzes, enriches, and disseminates legal information in Québec.

PÉNAL (DROIT) : La peine de cinq ans imposée à l’accusé, qui s’est reconnu coupable de conduite avec les facultés affaiblies ayant causé la mort de l’une des victimes et des lésions corporelles à une autre, n’est pas manifestement non indiquée et c’est à bon droit que la juge de . . . [more]

I remember in law school, my professor started our course in immigration law with a sound question, “apart from the CRA, which is the most profitable department in the Federal Government?” Apparently, the answer at the time was the department of immigration. The right of permanent residence fee (RPLF) was a whopping $975 per person, the initial fee for a humanitarian application was $1,100 and there were additional fees. Refugees coming to Canada were particularly burdened by these fees. Public pressure and litigation led to a review of onerous fees and many were reduced by 50%. It was clear then, . . . [more]

It was recently reported in the media that after signing a peace bond, Jian Ghomeshi apologized in court on May 11, 2016, for his “sexually inappropriate conduct” towards a former co-worker who accused him of sexually assaulting her. Following the apology, the Crown withdrew the criminal charge of sexual assault for which Ghomeshi was slated to stand trial on June 6, 2016. . . . [more]