As most everyone will know, the story broke last week that lawyer Edgar Schmidt is suing the federal Attorney General because of a practice within the Department of Justice, where he is employed, that too easily finds legislation passing the Charter "sniff" test. Two documents in that case are available on Slaw via the links below.

I recently had the occasion to spend some time at one of Nova Scotia’s more famous sites, Oak Island. Despite the relatively small footprint of the island, there is a wealth of legend regarding the island. Growing up in the Maritimes I thought Oak Island was a real life Treasure Island and in fact I may not have been far off. Dating from 1795 when a youth noticed some lights on the island and began to dig, the legend of the Oak Island Treasure has traveled far and wide. It is reputed that a pirate (or Spanish or French) treasure . . . [more]

The government, through the Ministry of Municipal Affairs and Housing, is holding a two-month public consultation to develop updated accessibility requirements for the Building Code.

The lockout is over and the players are back at practice. Time to skate on? Yes, but I think we ought to look at the “game tape” to review the effectiveness of some of the legal wrangling that took place in Canada. After all, we’ll likely be back in the same place in 10 years. As discussed in a previous post, the NHLPA filed proceedings before the labour boards of Quebec and Alberta against the NHL, seeking to have the lockout declared illegal. What happened to those proceedings? Not much…

The interim relief sought in both cases was rejected . . . [more]

By now you have probably read, heard or seen the story that has been circulating this week about the 15 year old girl in Iceland whose name has been deemed illegal. Blaer, a 15 year-old girl whose name translates into “a light wind” in Icelandic, has been told that she will have to change her name as her name was incorrectly registered when she was born and is not on the national register of acceptable names. While the story seems absurd on the surface, there is some context that has to do with the nature of the Icelandic language and . . . [more]

The federal Statutes Repeal Act S.C. 2008, c. 20 sweeps up behind our legislators, killing off statutes that were passed and assented to nine years or more ago but that were never proclaimed in force. At the beginning of each year the Minister of Justice is required to lay before both houses of parliament a list of such statutes. If by the end of that year a statute on the list still has not been proclaimed in force, it is ipso facto repealed.

Ontario’s Accessibility Standard for Customer Service came into effect on January 1, 2012 for all businesses and not-for-profits in the province with more than one employee. If an organization has more than 20 employees, an online report must be filed by December 31, 2012 to demonstrate to the government that accessibility has been achieved under the Customer Service Standard. Many organizations are now asking “what comes next?

No the Omni design has not been brought back for a new bus.

As disturbing as that may sound, the continuing debate over the “omnibus” has creepy characteristics itself.

In fairly recent times the Omnibus has been the subject of a few posts here at Slaw, The Unreasonable and Transgressive Nature of Omnibus Bills (Michael Posluns, June 24, 2011) , & Library of Parliament Paper on Omnibus Bills back in November by Michel-Adrien Sheppard. and myself when the storm of Bill-38 was occurring. Well I’m back with an update. In recent years all of us in Canada have been riding . . . [more]

Wikipedia’s article of the day on its main page today is a reference ot the House of Lords decision in Pepper v Hart. The case established the ability of English courts to use legislative history in interpreting unclear provisions of legislation. The full article goes into some detail about why the history had not been available before (parliamentary privilege under the 1689 Bill of Rights – the courts must not criticize Parliament) and why it might be a bad idea now (it would be too much work for lawyers giving advice or drafting to have to wade through Hansard . . . [more]

The French language constitutes the foundation of Québec’s identity and of a distinct culture that is open to the world.

I have a question that I’m hoping I can crowd-source here at Slaw, or perhaps Slaw-source. I have asked several friends and acquaintances and have yet to get a satisfactory answer. Charity as a legal concept dates back to 1601 and the Statute of Charitable Uses 1601 (aka. Statute of Elizabeth) wherein the preamble to the act contained the first statutory definition of charitable uses. Since that time the nature and scope of charities has changed dramatically; to the point where some have become leery of large charities that are run more like a business than a charity. This leads . . . [more]

So-called omnibus bills have been in the news a lot this year. The 2012 federal budget that amended dozens of pieces of legislation was referred to by many commentators as an omnibus bill.

What is this legislative creature?

The Library of Parliament recently published a paper entitled Omnibus Bills: Frequently Asked Questions that tries to get to the bottom of the issue:

Omnibus bills have been used for decades by governments of various political stripes as a vehicle to propose certain kinds of legislation to Parliament. While their use is well entrenched in Canadian parliamentary practice, it is nonetheless often

. . . [more]