but aims it at Justice Karakatsanis of the Supreme Court of Canada.

The editorial, published April 3, 2013, is here. It has the title “A Supreme Court justice struggles to make an impact”. As one might expect, the editorial is not signed and does not provide sources.

If I were marking that editorial, on the merits, I’d fail it, even if its assertions were correct. That’s because the editorial provides no valid basis for its claims. The sole reason the editorial gives for its conclusion is the number of judgments Justice Karakatsanis has authored to date (without any mention . . . [more]

The UK newspaper The Guardian has published a series of articles on Internet privacy – the right to be forgotten which addresses many of the issues surrounding the (occasionally embarrassing) traces we leave as we use online services.

Reading some of the articles got me feeling a little bit paranoid:

The internet has a long memory. But what if the pictures, data and personal information that it can pull up about you appear unfair, one-sided or just plain wrong? More and more people are claiming they have a “right to be forgotten” and are even trying to delete themselves from

. . . [more]

Do governments owe us clean air and clean water? Many Canadians expect our government to protect us from contamination and other environmental harms in outdoor air, water and land. But is this a legal right?

The first formal recognition of environmental rights is found in the Stockholm Declaration, signed in 1972. Principle 1 recognizes our “fundamental right to freedom, equality and adequate conditions of life, in an environment of a quality that permits a life of dignity and well-being.” But this is international law, more of a statement of aspiration than a legal requirement.

David Boyd, one of Canada’s . . . [more]

We in Canada have little understanding of the legal services industry in Australia, whether this is due to geography or wilful blindness is unclear. But given our common legal heritage and commonwealth brotherhood (whenever I’m in Asia, Canadians seem to bond easiest with Aussies – in the pubs at least) we should pay much more attention to the land down under. Especially since it’s thinking on legal services delivery is years ahead of our own.

So I count myself fortunate to be able to grow my contacts in Australia.

Aussie management/legal consultant George Beaton has put me onto a post . . . [more]

On April 1, 2013, the federal government launched the new Social Security Tribunal, which aims to simplify the process of appealing government decisions related to benefits under the Employment Insurance Act, Canada Pension Plan and Old Age Security Act.

The impacts of privacy sensitivities continue to expand and affect all manner of technology and other transactions transactions. 

Canada and the United States have a long healthy and constructive relationship in providing assistance to the law enforcement agencies of each country in the investigation of cross boarder criminal activity. Canada has, with the United States and with other countries a series of mutual cooperation arrangements (including Mutual Law Assistance Treaties or MLATs) in place between Canadian and U.S. law enforcement by which criminal and terrorist conduct can be investigated and relevant information exchanged.

Such international cooperation is routine and rarely . . . [more]

Each Thursday 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.

Unruly Voices: Essays on Democracy, Civility and the Human Imagination
Mark Kingwell
Toronto: Biblioasis, 2012

Excerpt: pp. 131 – 133

Intellectuals and Democracy

You might think judges would make diverting dinner companions, but I can tell you that on the whole they don’t. The judge sitting next to me, who shall go . . . [more]

Readwrite mobile says that the very first cell phone call was placed 40 years ago today by Motorola Division Manager Martin Cooper. It was not until many years later – March 6, 1983, that it went on sale.

We now take our cellphones for granted – but what a difference a few decades make. The original Motorola DynaTAC sold for $3,995 ($9209 in today’s dollars) was 10 inches high (plus the antenna), and weighed 1 3/4 pounds. And of course it could only make phone calls. The smartphones we throw in our pockets today have more computing power than a . . . [more]

In 2008, a woman was stopped on the streets of Ottawa, questioned, and arrested for public intoxication. When inside the cellblocks, she was restrained by four male officers. Sergeant Steve Desjourdy then used scissors to cut her shirt and bra off. She was then left topless in a cell for three hours.

Desjourdy was initially cleared of any misconduct by the Ottawa Police Service’s internal investigation, but a second investigation by the province’s Special Investigations Unit resulted in a charge of sexual assault being laid against him.

In a verdict issued this morning, Desjourdy was acquitted of sexual assault. Despite . . . [more]

CANLII and the Quest for Comprehensive Case Law Databases

CanLII now appears to be wallowing in the murky waters of determining what constitutes a “comprehensive” case law database. This question has plagued commercial legal publishers for more than two decades without anyone offering a clear answer. Welcome to the world of legal publishing.

An independent study

According to its press releases, CanLII has made the comprehensiveness of its court collections a priority. But what does that really mean? In an attempt to figure it out, CanLII’s Board of Directors has “approved the commissioning of an independent study to support its . . . [more]

The Manitoba Law Reform Commission last week issued two reports recommending changes to legislation re: nuisance claims and commercial tenancies.

Report #126 focuses on The Nuisance Act and The Farm Practices Protection Act. These two pieces of legislation currently limit the scope of the common law tort of nuisance in Manitoba. The Commission recommends repeal of The Nuisance Act and a broad, inter-disciplinary and public review of The Farm Practices Protection Act. 

Chapter 2 of the Report contains a succinct and potentially useful summary of the common law of both public and private nuisance and points to the ongoing . . . [more]

The continued development of CanLII into a comprehensive source for primary legal information has created an environment where, over time, the incremental cost of primary legal information in Canada will deviate toward zero. This has important implications for both commercial and non-profit legal publishers in Canada, because it will disrupt current business models as clients continue to become more unwilling to pay for this content at existing rates. This change will create particular opportunities for CanLII to leverage its position as the provider of free information in ways that are not open to those with a fee based, closed access . . . [more]