Each Monday we present brief excerpts of recent posts from five of Canada’s award­-winning legal blogs chosen at random* from more than 80 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. Legal Feeds 2. The Trauma-Informed Lawyer 3. Michael Geist 4. Double Aspect 5. Timely Disclosure

Legal Feeds
SCC affirms 7-2 that methods of medical treatment cannot be patented in Canada

Methods of medical treatment cannot be patented under Canadian law, the Supreme Court of Canada ruled in . . . [more]

As a supplement to our Sunday Summary each month, Supreme Advocacy LLP in Ottawa presents Supreme One-Liners, a super-short descriptive guide to the most recent decisions at the Supreme Court of Canada. Supreme Advocacy LLP offers its more comprehensive weekly electronic newsletter, Supreme Advocacy Letter, summarizing all Appeals, Oral Judgments and Leaves to Appeal granted.

Leave to Appeal Granted

Sentencing: Mandatory Minimums
Quebec (Attorney General) v. Denis, 2026 SCC 25

Mandatory minimum of six months for obtaining sexual services from minor is constitutional.

Intellectual Property: Patents
Pharmascience Inc. v. Janssen Inc., 2026 SCC 26 (41209)

What is/is not . . . [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) : L’usage que faisait l’appelante de son téléphone cellulaire au moyen d’un dispositif mains libres intégré à son véhicule n’était pas un usage autorisé en raison du fait qu’elle tenait en main son appareil durant la conversation téléphonique admise.

Intitulé : Rahme c. Ville de Laval, 2026 QCCA . . . [more]

“Where’s my book?”

“On your bookcase.”

A pause. “Where on the bookcase?”

“The middle shelf.”

Another pause. “Where on the middle shelf?”

I let that hang for a second, my hands covered in the pie pastry I’d been rolling out. Maybe, if I just gave it some time, the book would reveal itself from its sophisticated hiding place of … the middle shelf of a tiny three-shelf bookcase.

It did not. So, I did what mothers do and retrieved the book.

I used to tell this story from my kid’s childhood for laughs, but it points to a deeper truth. . . . [more]

Now in an era in which it is uncommon to find much discussion and newly written commentary on aspects of law publishing, as distinct from artificial intelligence technology, it was a pleasant surprise to encounter New Perspectives on the Legal Treatise. The content of the book was edited by Femi Cadmus, who, at the time, was law librarian and Professor of Law at Yale Law School and Nicholas Mignanelli, Assistant Dean and Director of the Mabee Legal Information Center [sic] and Associate Professor of Law at the University of Tulsa College of Law. Its contributions are based . . . [more]

At a conference of law teachers at Western in June, I took part in discussions among professors and lawyers about whether facility with AI should be a core competence in a Canadian law degree at this point in time. This gave rise to larger questions about whether law profs now have an ethical or pedagogical duty of some kind to familiarize themselves with AI and develop methods of teaching students how to use it effectively. This, in turn, pointed to the even larger question of what it means to be a competent lawyer in the age of AI.

Put another . . . [more]

Each Monday we present brief excerpts of recent posts from five of Canada’s award­-winning legal blogs chosen at random* from more than 80 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. Canadian Class Actions Monitor 2. Know How 3. Canadian Appeals Monitor 4. David Whelan 5. Welcome to the Food Court

Canadian Class Actions Monitor
Submission to Finance Canada as part of its Pre-budget Consultations in Advance of the upcoming 2025 Fall Federal Budget

There has been a . . . [more]

One Sunday each month we bring you a summary from Supreme Advocacy LLP of recent decisions at the Supreme Court of Canada. Supreme Advocacy LLP offers a weekly electronic newsletter, Supreme Advocacy Letter, to which you may subscribe. It’s a summary of all Appeals, Oral Judgments and Leaves to Appeal granted from April 18 – June 25, 2026 inclusive.

Appeal

Civil Litigation/Elections: Collateral Attack; Abuse of Process; Parliamentary Privilege; Immunity
Resler v. Anglin, 2024 ABCA 113; 2026 SCC 23 (41298)

Can an unsuccessful election candidate bring a civil claim against an elections officer for the tort of . . . [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) : Un examen inégal des témoignages de l’appelant et de la victime d’agression sexuelle allant au-delà de la méthodologie est démontré; l’analyse de la crédibilité de l’appelant a mené à un renversement du fardeau de la preuve, et la Cour d’appel ordonne la tenue d’un nouveau procès.

Intitulé . . . [more]

As a supplement to our Sunday Summary each month, Supreme Advocacy LLP in Ottawa presents Supreme One-Liners, a super-short descriptive guide to the most recent decisions at the Supreme Court of Canada. Supreme Advocacy LLP offers its more comprehensive weekly electronic newsletter, Supreme Advocacy Letter, summarizing all Appeals, Oral Judgments and Leaves to Appeal granted.

Leave to Appeal Granted

Bankruptcy: Contempt
Lymer v. Jonsson, 2025 ABCA 423 (42227)

Civil contempt issues in bankruptcy.

Civil Litigation: Contempt; Charter s. 11 (c)
Estate of Craig Sutherland, et al. v. Murphy, 2025 ONCA 227 (41818)

Civil contempt issues in injunctions and . . . [more]

Through my own journey with chronic pain, I am acutely aware of the impact language can have on your health. More specifically, I recognize the role catastrophizing plays in magnifying pain and that simple word substitutions can facilitate healing. It has also triggered a recognition that the language I use with clients may also negatively contribute to their anxiety.

Catastrophizing involves exaggerating the severity of a situation and jumping to the worst possible conclusion. As noted in the recent Psychology Today article, “Catastrophizing”:

Everyone has negative thoughts. But for many people, negative thinking can spin out of control and be

Several times each month, we are pleased to republish a recent book review from the Canadian Law Library Review (CLLR). CLLR is the official journal of the Canadian Association of Law Libraries (CALL/ACBD), and its reviews cover both practice-oriented and academic publications related to the law.

Equal and Inalienable Rights: Essays on the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Edited by Melanie R. Bueckert & Derek B.M. Ross. Toronto: LexisNexis, 2024. xlii, 458 p. ISBN 9780433533801 (softcover) $145.00.

Reviewed by Emily Da Silva
Head, Research Support (Education, Law, Management, and Social Sciences)
University of Ottawa Library

This . . . [more]