On December 4, 2013, the Honourable James Moore, Minister of Industry announced that Canada’s new anti-spam law (CASL) will come into force on July 1, 2014.

Concurrent with this announcement, Industry Canada published its finalized Electronic Commerce Protection Regulations (ECPR) with respect to CASL. These regulations were released in response to concerns that its initial set of regulations imposed unnecessary and overly burdensome requirements with respect to the dissemination of commercial electronic messages (CEMs).

After further consultation, Industry Canada introduced a degree of increased flexibility in the ECPR by including, among other things, changes related to familial relationships, excluded CEMs, . . . [more]

It has long been an open secret that our articling system is deeply flawed. But is it unethical?

Articling today is a system that would be equally at home in Downton Abbey and in Booker Prize Winner Hillary Mantel’s Wolf Hall.

While I don’t think articling is inherently unethical, I do believe that it is inherently unequal and therefore creates an environment where unethical behavior is possible. Articling takes a vulnerable and powerless law student who is often carrying a significant financial debt and requires her to be at the beck and call of an experienced lawyer with largely . . . [more]

The Supreme Court of Canada recently upheld in Katz Group Canada Inc. v. Ontario the decision by the Ontario Court of Appeal in finding that the Drug Interchangeability and Dispensing Fee Act Regulations, R.R.O. 1990, Reg. 93, s. 9 and Ontario Drug Benefit Act Regulation, O. Reg. 201/96, s. 12.0. were not ultra vires. The regulations in question had the effect of banning private label pharmaceuticals in Ontario.

The facts were set out by Justice Abella as follows:

[3] The sale and pricing of generic drugs is provincially regulated. In Ontario, two complementary and intersecting statutes were introduced

. . . [more]

This week's summaries concern: Race and mandatory minimum sentences / Cruel and unusual punishment and mandatory minimums:

Recours collectif: Le recours collectif intenté contre la Banque Royale du Canada par des personnes ayant perdu leurs investissements dans les fonds Olympus à la suite d'une fraude est autorisé.

The federal government’s Bill C-13 has come in for a good deal of well-deserved criticism — principally for being in fact an omnibus bill and for increasing the power of authorities to invade our privacy. A recent critique of the bill by Peter Nowak in Canadian Business caught my attention because it reminded me that it’s still illegal to publish a crime comic. The prohibition occurs in s.613 of the Criminal Code:

163. (1) Every one commits an offence who . . .

(b) makes, prints, publishes, distributes, sells or has in his possession for the purpose

. . . [more]

We recently had the pleasure of serving on a Fairfax Bar Association CLE faculty which included Circuit Court Chief Judge Dennis Smith, and Circuit Court Judges John Tran and Jane Roush. Their panel offering their insights on e-discovery in state courts was warmly received.

Judge Smith got the ball rolling by talking about the difference between digital immigrants and digital natives, terms coined more than a decade ago by author, educator and lecturer Marc Prensky.

Digital immigrants didn’t grow up with technology and digital natives did. Many judges are digital immigrants. Some will “learn a new language” and immerse themselves . . . [more]

Mumbling covers a lot of sins. When you’re abashed or ill-prepared or simply your usual fifteen minutes away from l’esprit d’escalier, mumbling could be the way to go. Broca’s area has lost contact with ground control, yet utterance is obligatory: dive! dive! dive! And from somewhere deep in the reptilian part of your think gel come noises that sound so close to speech that some of the people some of the time can be fooled.

Lawyers don’t get to mumble much, though. For one thing, it doesn’t work very well in print (which is not to say it’s impossible) . . . [more]

Each year on December 1st we open up Clawbies.ca for “nomination season”, a month long process where online participants can highlight some of their favourite voices within the Canadian legal blogosphere.

This past Sunday we were pleased to carry forward that tradition once again – unbelievably for the 8th time! The website theme and award badges got their annual facelift, and the announcement post went live at 9:00 am eastern/6:00 pacific.

A handful of days later, and I’m happy to share our annual “good will project” is off to a great start (and not just Erik Magraken, who now famously . . . [more]

I don’t know if Gmail and Google Calendar are much used within practice — I can think of a bunch of reasons why they shouldn’t be — but I’m certain that many of us who work in the legal industry use these applications in our private lives. In either case, it’s important to have control over your data. If you don’t access your Gmail via IMAP, you don’t have a local copy on your own machines. Now Google plans to let you simply download your mail data as they roll this ability out over the next month. Calendar data can . . . [more]

Environmental regulators and tribunals bear substantial responsibilities and make important decisions regarding development in Canada. If they won’t listen to opponents of a project, will they breach the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms?

The issue has been raised before the courts recently regarding both a pipeline approval before the National Energy Board and regulation of ongoing fracking activities before the Alberta Energy Regulator. The AER replaced the Energy Resources Conservation Board (ERCB), and provides “full-lifecycle regulatory oversight of energy resource development in Alberta – from application and construction to abandonment and reclamation, and everything in between.”

The mandate . . . [more]

The November 2013 issue of Connected is now available online.

The bulletin covers news about the impact of social media on courts. Most of the items are about the United States, but there is occasional coverage of other jurisdictions.

The bulletin is published by the Virginia-based National Center for State Courts and the Conference of Court Public Information Officers.

In this issue:

• Michigan court to begin using social media to contact hard-to-reach parties
• Texas Judge bans social media use for child custody litigants
• How are governments using Instagram?
• Arizona Supreme Court launches new veterans’ clearinghouse website

  . . . [more]