The cherry blossoms are finished this season, but new information continues to come out from U.S. government sources. I may have been hibernating over the winter, but my colleagues at the Law Library of Congress have been very active. Their November posts included many updates to Congress.gov and in December they celebrated the sixth anniversary of Congress.gov with an annual over view update.

Their January post featured the “Unified Congressional Committee Calendar, where you can quickly view all of the House and Senate committee meetings and hearings scheduled for a given week or day”. February’s post includes . . . [more]

Justice Rooke’s 2012 lengthy decision in Meads v. Meads attracted considerable attention, in particular given the peculiar nature of the nature of the parties he deemed “Organized Pseudolegal Commercial Argument (OPCA) Litigants.”

These litigants defy any general definition, aside from using entirely fictitious legal arguments gleaned from the Internet which purports to provide them complete immunity from the legal system. They can use the term Freeman-on-the-Land to denote their entirely unsubstantiated belief that they are free from the rules and laws that the rest of us abide by.

The hope of Justice Rooke’s particular exposé, and its dissemination by . . . [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 as well as leaves to appeal granted so you will know what the SCC will soon be dealing with (April 20 to May 10, 2019 inclusive).

Oral Judgments

Criminal Law: Delay; Mootness

R. v. Thanabalasingham, 2018 QCCA 197; 2019 SCC 21 (37984)

The Chief Justice: “The test to be applied in this case . . . [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’appelant, l’une des personnes ciblées par l’enquête Mâchurer, menée par l’Unité permanente anti-corruption, n’obtient pas que soit rendue une ordonnance de non-publication des dénonciations qui ont conduit à décerner des mandats généraux visant des lieux qui lui étaient liés et qui, par ailleurs, n’ont mené à aucune . . . [more]

Ontario’s justice system is fast approaching a digital crossroads.

New technologies, including algorithms, automated decision-making and artificial intelligence (AI), are set to challenge our long-standing assumptions and practices regarding human rights, due process and access to justice.

How well do justice system professionals understand these technologies? What are the broad legal implications of adopting AI in the justice system? How can or should the justice system regulate these challenges?

These questions, and more, will be addressed in a free half-day educational event on Wednesday, May 15^th presented by the Law Commission of Ontario, Osgoode Hall Law School and . . . [more]

Each Friday, we share the latest job listings from Slaw Jobs, which features employment opportunities from across the country. Find out more about these positions by following the links below, or learn how you can use Slaw Jobs to gain valuable exposure for your job ads, while supporting the great Canadian legal commentary at Slaw.ca.

Current postings on Slaw Jobs (newest first):

• Content Editor–Western Employment & Labour Law Subject Matter Expert (Contract Role) | Concord, ON
  (First Reference Inc.)
• Chief of Legal Operations (Full-time) | Victoria, BC
  (British Columbia Ministry of Attorney General – Legal Services Branch)
• Chief of Legal

One common interpretation of intellectual property law is that it is not so much about protecting a creator’s natural law property rights (as is the case with bicycles and beachfront properties). Rather, intellectual property law is about motivating individuals to create and invent for the benefit of all. It has been carefully structured and revised over the years, by this reading, to spur on individual and corporate investment in fostering and consuming novelty. In the eighteenth century, when intellectual property took its modern legislative form, the intent was boldly declared to be the encouragement of learning and to promote the . . . [more]

On May 1, 2019, the Manitoba’s Accessibility Standard for Employment became the second standard enacted by Regulation (70/2019) under The Accessibility for Manitobans Act which aims to remove and prevent barriers in employment practices to meet the needs of employees and job applicants with disabilities.

The Accessibility Standard for Employment requires larger organizations and businesses with 50 or more employees to implement and document accessible employment policies, measures and practices (i.e., recruiting, performance review, career development etc.). They must also make these available to the public upon request in an accessible format, and provide reasonable accommodation to employees . . . [more]

The Ontario government dropped a bombshell on its legal aid system in its April 11 budget, hitting it with a 30% funding cut, with more to come in future years.

The province spoke of transforming the legal aid system. However, there is no underlying plan from the province – simply cuts. Legal Aid Ontario has to move quickly to implement the cuts, which apply to the 2019-20 budget. At the time of writing, it is unclear where the cuts will be made, although refugee services will end.

The impact on community clinics and student legal clinics is not yet clear. . . . [more]

Each Wednesday we tell you which three English-language cases and which French-language case have been the most viewed* on CanLII and we give you a small sense of what the cases are about.

For this last week:

1. Unrau v National Dental Examining Board, 2019 ABQB 283

[751] Ultimately, the judge must identify a basis for why the abusive litigant is plausibly expected to engage in litigation misconduct that spills outside of the current dispute. If there is no such expectation, then a vexatious litigant order gatekeeping step is neither necessary, nor appropriate. The abusive litigant can instead be . . . [more]

In 2018, Alberta amended its whistleblower protection legislation. It is a modest improvement over previous legislation, and relative to the federal Act. However, in a number of respects, the legislation does not go far enough.

First, a little bit of context. Whistleblowing legislation serves two inter-related purposes: upholding the public interest in exposing serious wrongdoing, while protecting employees who blow the whistle on that wrongdoing. On this last point, the legislation is remedial by protecting the employee from dismissal or reprisal that might otherwise be permitted at common law. In Canada, whistleblowing legislation (which exists in most provinces) . . . [more]