On Oct. 20, 2018, the City of Toronto its 86th municipal election, the largest city in Canada, with the 6th largest government in the country and nearly 8% of the entire country’s population. On July 27, 2018, just a few months before this election, the new Premier of Ontario, Doug Ford, announced that he will reduce the number of city council seats from 44 to 25.

There have been calls supporting and opposing this exact change, years before Premier Ford won the provincial election this year. Other cities around the world have effectively functioned with similar numbers in representation. The . . . [more]

One Sunday each month OnPoint Legal Research provides Slaw with an extended summary of, and counsel’s commentary on, an important case from the British Columbia, Alberta, or Ontario court of appeal.

H.M.B. Holdings Limited v. Replay Resorts Inc., 2018 BCCA 263

AREAS OF LAW:  Practice & procedure; Solicitor-client privilege; Implied waiver; Abuse of process

~ A party must “voluntarily inject into the litigation” legal advice it received for there to be an implied waiver of privilege regarding that advice. ~

BACKGROUND:

The Appellant, H.M.B. Holdings Limited (“HMB”), is the former owner of the Half Moon Bay Resort in Antigua and . . . [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.

MAGISTRATURE (DÉONTOLOGIE JUDICIAIRE) : Le juge R. Peter Bradley a enfreint les articles 1, 6 et 8 du Code de déontologie de la magistrature; la Cour d’appel ne recommande pas à la ministre de la Justice de le démettre de ses fonctions et estime qu’une réprimande, soit la sanction . . . [more]

What should people who want to practice law have to do before they are licensed? This perennial debate has bloomed once again. The Law Society of Ontario (LSO) is seeking feedback on its Options for Lawyer Licensing consultation paper (Slaw summary here). Two of the LSO’s four options would abolish articling. Candidates would instead have to pass exams covering both legal skills and substantive knowledge. There would also be a law practice program, either required for all candidates (LSO’s Option 4) or only for those practicing in smaller firms (Option 3).

Thinking of licensing in terms of footbridges over . . . [more]

New Brunswick violence and harassment provisions under the Occupational Health and Safety Act and General Regulation 91-191 aimed at identifying and preventing violence and harassment in the workplace will take effect September 1, 2018. Currently, New Brunswick is the only Atlantic province that does not specifically address the issue of workplace violence in its health and safety laws. All Atlantic provinces do not currently address harassment in health and safety laws. New Brunswick will be the first.

While certain occupational groups, such as health-care workers, tend to be more at risk of workplace violence or harassment, these new regulations will . . . [more]

Periodically on Thursdays, we present a significant excerpt, usually from a recently published book or journal article. In every case the proper permissions have been obtained. If you are a publisher who would like to participate in this feature, please let us know via the site’s contact form.

Legal Research, Legal Reasoning and Precedent in Canada in the Digital Age

Jonathan de Vries is a Partner at Shillingtons LLP in London, Ontario and a PhD Candidate at Western University.

(2018) 48 Advocates’ Quarterly 1.

Excerpt: Sections 1, 4, 5 and 6

[Footnotes omitted. They can be found in the original . . . [more]

Well, it’s finally here. In the fall of 2017, a vulnerability in WPA2 wireless encryption was discovered. Known as the Krack Attack, the flaw impacts every implementation of WPA2. The manufacturers needed to provide a patch update to fix the flaw. The Wi-Fi Alliance has now announced the availability of the WPA3 standard (to be implemented in certified devices starting later this year), vastly improving security over WPA2, which has been around for over 15 years and should be the current WiFi encryption of choice. WPA3 provides a new security protocol that contains improvements in terms of configuration, authentication and . . . [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. Eabametoong First Nation v. Minister of Northern Development and Mines, 2018 ONSC 4316

[1] On March 31, 2016, The Director of Exploration for the Ministry of Northern Development and Mines (“the Director”) granted an exploration permit (the “Permit”) to Landore Resource Canada Inc. (“Landore”). The Permit authorizes mine exploration drilling in an area in Northern Ontario that is within the traditional territory of . . . [more]

If you’ve been grappling with the practical, real-world meaning of “value” in legal services delivery — and many of us have been — then I want to start this post by recommending a recently released paper from Prof. Noel Semple of the University of Windsor Faculty of Law. “Measuring Legal Service Value” is available for download at SSRN. A lengthy except is available here at Slaw (Part 1 and Part 2), and it is worth your time and consideration.

The core of Noel’s article, although by no means the entirety of his thesis, is expressed in . . . [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.

Technology

Writing With Mind Maps
Luigi Benetton

When I start to write a document, the ideas in it never get to the page in publishable order. (I know I’m not alone in this.) Pieces of the “story” float about. …

Research & Writing

One L or Two?
Neil Guthrie

An assistant called me recently, asking whether the other side on a transaction was correct to keep inserting an extra . . . [more]