While British legislation is now cited in the format Northern Ireland Act 1998 (UK), s 5, pre-1963 legislation (which is more likely to be referred to in Canadian courts than the newer legislation) is slightly more complicated. ¹

Older British legislation is cited using a regnal year, e.g. Statute of Frauds, 1677, 29 Car II, c 3. The regnal year consists of the shortened version of the monarch’s name (in this case Car II for Charles II where “Car” is the shortened version of Carolus, the Latin for Charles) preceded by a number or numbers indicating the . . . [more]

You can’t swing a dead cat around practice management and legal tech circles without hitting somebody talking about ChatGPT. And I know a lot of lawyers have developed a bone-deep fatigue of hearing about all things AI over the past few weeks.

I’ll admit, I am really interested in (and a bit worried about) what feels like the beginning of a sharp upward trajectory of AI’s presence in the professional lives of lawyers. Growing up watching sci fi movies in the 80s left me with a healthy concern of what will happen eventually with AI, but I also don’t think . . . [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.

FAILLITE ET INSOLVABILITÉ : Le retour aux études d’un débiteur libéré d’une faillite dans le cadre de laquelle une dette étudiante constituait une réclamation prouvable ne fait pas renaître cette dette.

Intitulé : Bataille c. Procureur général du Québec, 2023 QCCA 169
Juridiction : Cour d’appel (C.A.), Montréal
Décision de . . . [more]

Written by Daniel Standing LL.B., Editor, First Reference Inc.

Before you read any further, you’ll want Rockwell’s “Somebody’s Watching Me” playing in the background. Can you think of something that pits management rights against privacy in the workplace quite like surveillance cameras do? The potential for these unblinking eyes to be abused prompted the union in [2023] A.G.A.A. No. 3 to file a policy grievance unsuccessfully challenging their presence in one workplace. . . . [more]

ChatGPT was launched by OpenAI, an American-based AI research and deployment company, in November 2022. The free, easy to access tool quickly captured the public’s attention. Described in the New York Times as “quite simply, the best artificial intelligence chatbot ever released to the general public”, ChatGPT hit 1 million users in 5 days and skyrocketed to 100 million users in January. In response to ChatGPT’s launch, both Microsoft and Google have announced plans to offer new AI-enhanced, chat-based search tools.

It wasn’t long before lawyers started paying attention. A quick Google search yields over 40,000 hits for “ChatGPT” and . . . [more]

In Access to Justice research, there is now a recognition that innovation and reform require input from a variety of stakeholders. This includes not only the justice system’s insiders, but its users as well. This acknowledgment has, in turn, shaped research initiatives aimed at tackling the crisis in Access to Justice. Essentially, to fix the problem, it is important to understand how the problem is experienced by actual users and what would help those experiencing the problem.

For a very long time, this was not the case. And while great strides have been made over the last several years among . . . [more]

Here is Parallax Information Consulting‘s first infographic based on data published in the Canadian Legal Problems Survey public use microdata file outlining the health problems associated with legal problems in Canada.

You can see an accessible and animated version here.

(Une version française est ici.)

. . . [more]

What relief is available to a Court when dealing with the breach of a protective order and breach of the implied undertaking rule? The Federal Court had occasion to consider this question in Molo Design Ltd. v. Chanel Canada ULC, 2023 FC 140. In a decision dated January 30, 2023, the Federal Court made an order to enforce a Protective Order issued in the action and to enforce the implied undertaking rule.

The facts were that a co-founder of the plaintiff Molo Design Ltd. disclosed information in documents disclosed by Chanel in the action that were designated “Confidential” under . . . [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) Bien que l’intimé ait purgé sa peine en lien avec l’homicide involontaire coupable pour lequel il avait été déclaré coupable au terme d’un procès devant un juge seul tenu sans le consentement de la poursuite, un nouveau procès est ordonné; celui-ci portera sur l’accusation plus grave de meurtre . . . [more]

Between 2018 and 2020, the Province of British Columbia granted multiple mineral claims on Banks Island, in the heart of Gitxaała Nation’s territory, without consulting Gitxaała. Under BC’s current Mineral Tenure Act, virtually anyone can become a “free miner” and acquire mineral rights online for a nominal fee through an automated system – with no requirement for Indigenous consultation or consent, or even notification.

The problematic practice of granting mineral tenures without consent is not new. In fact, it’s very old – with roots that date back to the Gold Rush era in BC, when colonial laws were first . . . [more]