My post in January 2021 introduced the Family Law Unbundled Legal Services Research Project funded by the Legal Aid BC / Law Foundation BC Legal Research Fund. In this post I am very pleased to advise that the report on Phase 1 of the project is now available here.

Quoting from the Executive Summary:

The Family Law Unbundled Legal Services Research Project (ULSRP) is an initiative designed to both evaluate the effectiveness of family unbundled legal services and to facilitate access to justice by enhancing the working relationships between the existing community of ULS providers and BC citizens most in

Simultaneously and in conjunction, Wolters Kluwer and Thomson Reuters have agreed to sell, in the case of the former, its legal information businesses in France and Spain, and in the latter, its Spanish legal information business, both to Karnov Group. There is change everywhere, as 2022 budget disciplines demand taking out the trash, and little is left in Europe in the hands of the giants.

Conversely, the news that Wolters Kluwer had sold its US academic publishing assets was hardly a surprise. For several years it has been withdrawing from the provision of legal information content. Long gone, in . . . [more]

Is there one piece of legal scholarship which you read years ago that sticks with you? For me it was an article about how a person’s right to legal name changes can be hindered by clerks who may misstate the law or a person’s options. The article is called Changing Name Changing: Framing Rules and the Future of Marital Names, and it was written by Elizabeth F. Emens and published in the University of Chicago Law Review in 2007.^[1] I believe I read it around 2015, and I remember being fascinated by the concept of “desk-clerk law.” In . . . [more]

Continuing my review of patent infringement proceedings in Federal Court, I will look at how cases actually move through the court. Focusing on patent infringement cases started in 2017, 2018 and 2019 (but excluding proceedings under the PM(NOC) regulations), for this group of about 140 cases, a statement of defence was only filed in about 75% of cases. In my last column (see ), my review suggested that about half of the cases were resolved in less than two years, typically by way of settlement or discontinuance.

In the 75% of cases where a defence was filed, the median time . . . [more]

The role of adjudicators in hearings with self-represented litigants (SRLs) has been discussed in many court decisions and articles. What is less explored is the role of opposing counsel. In this column I will discuss the possibly expanding role of opposing counsel in facilitating access to justice for SRLs. Although the adjudicator has the primary role in managing a hearing and in assisting the self-represented party, opposing counsel can play an important role. It is also important that adjudicators clearly communicate their expectations of the lawyer when a hearing includes an SRL.

The Canadian Judicial Council’s Statement of Principles on . . . [more]

I was speaking with a colleague the other day who was celebrating a significant wedding anniversary. For fun we started looking up the modern vs. traditional anniversary gifts. As I’m sure you can imagine, they vary! But as much as we may like the gift to celebrate the moment, it is the sentiment that is really important.

Milestones and anniversaries should be fun. In our world, law firms have special histories that should be celebrated. Milestones also offer an opportunity to look forward.

For a firm celebrating a milestone, the first questions to ask is who do we want to . . . [more]

I live in Etobicoke, Toronto’s western suburb. We used to have our own courts, right here in the west end. There were family and criminal courts at 40 East Mall, and a Landlord Tenant Board outpost on Dundas Street West. Just over the Humber River, in the original City of Toronto, there was a Small Claims Court on Keele Street (pictured above). People asserting civil rights, or facing criminal charges, could visit a courthouse in their own community.

Nowadays, there isn’t a single physical court or tribunal of any kind in Etobicoke. To get to a family court or small . . . [more]

Fear of not having enough files, status, or money underpins many recurring woes that arise in legal practice.

Is either of these scarcity mindset challenges showing up for you or a partner at your law firm?

You are constantly buried in too much work. Clients are clamoring for attention. You feel like you are on a hamster wheel of deadlines and stress.

You cycle through associates who burn out dealing with your last-minute emergencies and leave your firm.

Still, you worry: “I can’t turn away work; what if I don’t get another file?”

Having too many clients and work and . . . [more]

There have been some recent legal developments that compel us to consider the role and responsibilities of judges in cases involving family violence. First, amendments to the Divorce Act, RSC 1985, c 3 (2nd Supp), came into effect in March 2021 and the Act now stipulates that family violence is a factor relevant to the best interests of the child. Family violence is finally recognized federally as germane to judicial decisions on parenting, though it is not explicitly recognized as relevant to whether negotiated settlements are an appropriate expectation, which has important implications for the judge’s role in . . . [more]

“There is nothing we can do right now. Afghanistan’s justice system [has] collapsed [right] now. If we say that Afghanistan’s justice system has collapsed since the Taliban took over, we might not be exaggerating.” said Adnan, a nickname of the person I interviewed with him, chosen for security reasons. He shared these words during our online interview in mid-November 2021. Adnan left Kabul, Afghanistan in July 2020 where he was working as a Legal Advisor with the government of Afghanistan. Through this position and previous ones, Adnan has managed to make quite an impact on law librarianship both inside and

As part of a holiday party gift-exchange mixup, you have been accidentally given a time machine. Since the Rules of Professional Conduct don’t specifically say you can’t tamper with history, you may now use it to travel throughout all of the past and future. You decide to visit great legal moments along the timeline, because you’re weird.

Respond to the following scenarios with the choice that seems the most appropriate.

1. You are present as the Code of Hammurabi is finalized in 1750 BC. Impressed by your Fitbit, Hammurabi invites you to add a line to the Code. What do . . . [more]

The broad powers of the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) were reinforced in the CRTC’s Compliance and Enforcement Decision CRTC 2020-196.

In the course of investigation of numerous complaints in relation to a short message service (SMS) phishing scam the person designated by the CRTC under Canada’s Anti-spam Law (CASL) (the “investigator”) issued a notice to produce to Hydro-Québec in relation to 10 service addresses and customer accounts.

Hydro-Québec is not the source of the SMS messages under investigation It is merely an innocent third party that has files that the investigator wants to review to assess the service, . . . [more]