Former attorney general Jody Wilson-Raybould’s resistance to the pressure by various actors to instruct the director of public prosecutions to offer to negotiate a remediation agreement (the Canadian name for a deferred prosecution agreement) with SNC-Lavalin and her testimony before the House Judiciary Committee have been explained in different ways: respect for the rule of law and the role of the attorney general, a lack of pragmatism or political experience, too much sense of self, a desire for revenge. The difference between the prime minister’s and other members of government’s relationship to political interference, and the clerk of the privy . . . [more]

Here are excerpts from the most recent tips on SlawTips, the site that each week offers up useful advice, short and to the point, on practice, research, writing and technology.

Research & Writing

That Awful Extra ‘of’
Neil Guthrie

You’ve already been advised in a previous post not to say outside of or inside of. The of is both unnecessary and incorrect in each case. Of creeps in elsewhere, where it should not. As in the shudder-inducing off of, Please, just off. Or perhaps from (I got it from the internet, not off of). …

Technology

Restore Support for . . . [more]

The two biggest political scandals in the news right now – the Mark Norman trial, and the Trudeau/SNC-Lavalin controversy – were exposed by a reliable source who secretly shared information with a journalist. Increasingly this is only viable way that scandals are brought to the public’s attention in this country.

More traditional methods of uncovering corruption – access to information laws, and whistleblower protections that are supposed to encourage employees to disclose wrongdoing – are increasingly irrelevant. As to the former, we know that much information is categorically off limits, delayed, destroyed, not recorded, or access . . . [more]

The interaction between law enforcement and notions of privacy in the security of our homes has always been a special focus of s. 8 Charter rights. The treatment of the home as a special place in the law was described by Justice Binnie in R. v. Tessling as a nuanced hierarchy protecting privacy of places, used to evaluate the reasonableness of a person’s expectation of privacy.

This privacy interest is not absolute, and although the “dwelling house” enjoys the greatest expectation of privacy, the perimeter space around the home enjoys a diluted measure of this same expectation.

One example 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.

TRANSPORT ET AFFRÈTEMENT : Les chauffeurs qui s’inscrivent sur l’application UberX dans le but d’entrer en relation avec des clients potentiels afin de conclure un contrat de transport rémunéré ne peuvent entretenir une expectative de vie privée.

Intitulé : Directeur des poursuites criminelles et pénales c. Aouichi, 2019 QCCQ 360 . . . [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):

• Conflict Lawyer (Part-time) | Vancouver, Calgary, Hamilton, Toronto, Ottawa, or Montreal
  (Gowling WLG)
• Policy Counsel (Full-time) | Ottawa, ON
  (Federation of Law Societies of Canada)
• Paralegal (Full-time) | Vancouver, BC
  (Ecojustice)
• Part-Time Research Lawyer (Contract Role) | Alberta

There has never been a time in our history when law was more needed than it is today. And there has never been a time in our history when we have taken law for granted as much as we do today.

We live in an age of STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Math) but we are fortunate to also live in a society governed by the Rule of Law. The products of STEM are everywhere around us. The Rule of Law, on the other hand, is largely invisible. The Rule of Law is like the oxygen that we breathe: invisible, . . . [more]

Important changes to the Canada Labour Code were recently made (i.e., Bill C-63 and C-86, among others), but the government’s work to modernize the Canada Labour Code isn’t done yet. On February 20, 2019, the federal government convened an independent expert panel to provide advice on five complex workplace issues facing Canadian employers and employees due to the changing nature of work. . . . [more]

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.

The Judicial Role in a Diverse Federation: Lessons from the Supreme Court of Canada. By Robert Schertzer. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2016. ix, 338 p. Includes tables, bibliography, and index. ISBN 978- 1487500283 (cloth) $52.50.

Reviewed by Kim Clarke
Director, Bennett Jones Law Library University of Calgary
In CLLR 43:4 . . . [more]

Two important new articles came across my desk in the last week or so. They each offer lists of new skills and aptitudes that will be needed by lawyers and conflict management professionals (mediators, arbitrators, negotiators etc.) in the “new world”.

In the first article, Noam Ebner and Elayne E. Greenberg explore this topic with the provocative title “What Dinosaurs Can Teach Lawyers About How to Avoid Extinction in the ODR Evolution.” (Note 1) They begin with the following salvo to the legal profession:

This paper is a wake-up call for the legal profession: Heed the justice changes

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. Ruston v. Keddco MFG. (2011) Ltd., 2019 ONCA 125

[18] It does not follow from the fact that this is the same conduct which the trial judge referred to in making the aggravated damages award that an award of punitive damages amounted to either double recovery or double punishment. That is because aggravated damages aim to compensate a plaintiff for heightened . . . [more]