The Federation of Law Societies of Canada (the “Federation”) is a national association of 14 Canadian law societies. One of the Federations roles is to approve Canadian law schools. To be approved a law school must require that each of its graduates meet the Federation’s National Requirement. But what is the National Requirement and what does it require?

The National Requirement, which came into force in 2015, sets out the specific knowledge and skills Canadian common law program graduates must demonstrate to be ready to enter a bar admission program. The National Requirement is also the standard against which internationally . . . [more]

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

For this past month, the three most-consulted English-language decisions were:

1. Baker v. Van Dolder’s Home Team Inc., 2025 ONSC 952

[4] The plaintiff was terminated “without cause” on May 24, 2023. The agreement between the parties stated that, “the issue to be determined on the motion will be whether the “with cause” provision of the Contract is enforceable or not”.

Seeing the title of this article, you may all think that maybe I am made a mistake regarding the topic. However, please let me assure you that this is not a mistake and with your indulgence, I will explain.

When my youngest child was a toddler, I had a hard time teaching her to say “thank you.”

Every time I would give her something and then ask: “what’s the magic word?” she would respond “abracadabra.”

This was quite funny, but I had to maintain my serious mom face as I did not want to raise a person who was not . . . [more]

Belated Happy New Year’s wishes. Things are not looking so happy in the US government so far. Many Civil Service employees are being laid off and/or paid to retire. Information is disappearing or being rewritten on many agency webpages. I just checked out the Department of Justice website that does appear to be reporting business as usual so far. I also found an Associated Press report about why some of the agency webpages went dark in February after an executive order on January 20^th. A follow up AP report on February 12 stated that some health agencies had . . . [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. Civil Resolution Tribunal blog 2. Family LLB 3. Know How 4. Hull & Hull Blog 5. RT Blog

Civil Resolution Tribunal blog
Participant Survey – January 2025

The Civil Resolution Tribunal anonymously surveys people who have gone through the tribunal process. We use this feedback to improve . . . [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.

ACTION COLLECTIVE (RECOURS COLLECTIF) : La Cour d’appel autorise l’action collective contre le CISSS de Lanaudière et 3 médecins y ayant exercé leur profession leur reprochant d’avoir procédé à la stérilisation des patientes autochtones membres du groupe sans avoir obtenu leur consentement libre et éclairé.

Intitulé : U.T. c. Centre . . . [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.

Oral Judgments

Criminal Law: Homicide
R. v. Chicoine-Joubert, 2025 SCC 3 (41262)

Mens rea for involuntary manslaughter; witness credibility.

Criminal Law: Party Liability
R. v. Bilodeau, 2025 SCC 2 (41320)

Common unlawful purpose; party liability; hearsay co-conspirators’ exception.

Leaves to Appeal

Language: Bilingualism . . . [more]

Fearmongering and fretting about impacts of the Big Four on the legal services sector are the equivalent of tilting at windmills and just as pointless.

I’m tired of overheated headlines and breathless reporting. No, I’m not talking about the trials and tribulations of tariffs and trade. I’m talking about the handwringing and blathering around KPMG’s successful application to practice law in Arizona.

For the love of all that’s holy, handwringers and blatherskites – knock it off.

Scaremongering and Stress

Many lawyers are triggered by fear. Anyone who deals with lawyers in any way, shape, or form knows that the . . . [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.

Out of Darkness: Rumana Monzur’s Journey through Betrayal, Tyranny and Abuse. By Denise Chong. Toronto: Penguin Random House Canada, 2024. 298 p. Includes photographs and author’s note. ISBN 9780735274150 (softcover) $24.95; ISBN 9780735274174 (eBook) $13.99.

Reviewed by Kyla McCallum
Student Librarian
University of British Columbia

In 2011, Rumana Monzur, a . . . [more]

Lawyers should “encourage public respect for and try to improve the administration of justice,” according to our code of professional conduct.

The “try to improve” part is fairly straightforward. When we see problems in our legal system we should try to fix them, whether or not we personally or our clients are affected. We should be part of the solutions, not part of the problems.

But what about “encouraging public respect” for the justice system? Improving it is one way to encourage respect for it: by making it more worthy of respect. But I don’t think that’s all the . . . [more]

If you’re fed up with seeing the AI summary at the top of your Google search results you have several options. The easiest thing to do is just add -AI to your search. 

However, if your search includes the term “AI”, this obviously won’t work:

In this case you have two options. You can either click on the web tab:

Or you can add profanity to your initial search:

(Admittedly this last method may give you results you weren’t expecting.)

— Susannah Tredwell . . . [more]