Here are the three most consulted English-language cases on CanLII for the week of November 8 – 14.

1. Bedford v. Canada, 2010 ONSC 4264

[1] There has been a long-standing debate in this country and elsewhere about the subject of prostitution. The only consensus that exists is that there is no consensus on the issue.

2. EJH (Re), 2011 SKQB 404

1) This is truly a remarkable story. The story of AH, a mother who has escaped a life of prostitution and squalor and bested addictions so that she might have the ability to parent her two

Anyone looking for a sign of the times for the state of access to justice in British Columbia will find at least 100 of them sprinkled throughout the province. In its efforts to provide maximum accessibility to some measure of free legal counsel for low- and modest-income British Columbians, Access Pro Bono (BC’s largest pro bono legal service provider) operates pro bono legal advice clinics in 100 different locations across BC— in communities stretching from the 59^th parallel down to the American border, from the Rocky Mountains over to the Pacific shores. Pro bono clinics are now more common . . . [more]

This article originally appeared in the Fall 2011 issue of LAWPRO Magazine. All issues of the magazine can be found at www.lawpro.ca/magazinearchives.

Technology is becoming an ever greater part of our lives, both personally and professionally. On a daily basis most of us use a cellphone or smartphone, a desktop computer and the Internet. Many of us will have an iPad or other tablet device and be posting updates on Facebook, Twitter or other social media tools.

Clients expect their lawyers to be technology literate – and there are always new and improved ways for communicating with clients. Here . . . [more]

On Wednesday the Canadian Association of Law Libraries will be presenting a webinar with Michel Gamache, Director of Documentation Services, Heenan Blaikie in Montreal. Michel will be explaining how to get started with Yahoo Pipes for working with RSS feeds to customize information for practice groups. Even if you do not work in a law firm, this webinar will help you get started taking your use of RSS feeds to the next level. I myself dabble in the use of Pipes and am looking forward to learning more.

The webinar takes place this Wednesday, November 16, 1:00 – 2:30 . . . [more]

How far can judicial review go before it trespasses on the proper function of government and the legislature? What is the proper role of the judiciary in constraining the actions of the democratic state?

Last week, UK Supreme Court nominee Jonathan Sumption Q.C.raised these questions in a speech on the subject of the widening scope of judicial review in the UK .

He concluded by warning that if it is perceived judges are reviewing the merits of legislation, there will be pressure for some kind of democratic input into their selection. He would regard this as a very unfortunate outcome . . . [more]

October 21 saw a most interesting and perhaps game-changing development in professional publishing with the launch in the UK of Bloomsbury Professional’s new online tax law service, www.bloomsburytax.com.

What makes the new service worth noting is not rocket science technology or really cutting-edge functionality but price and simplicity, combined with an unashamed resemblance to the book idiom in its presentation – a smart move, it might be suggested, in an e-book era.

The publisher, formerly Tottel Publishing, itself and, by implication, its content having roots and established credibility derived from LexisNexis origins, boasts that the key features of the . . . [more]

David S. Caudill, “Lawyers Judging Experts: Oversimplifying Science and Undervaluing Advocacy to Construct an Ethical Duty” (2011) 38 Pepperdine Law Review 674

Electronic copy available at: http://ssrn.com/abstract=1874947

The fact that judges, typically untrained in science, need to “resolve disputes among respected, well-credentialed scientists about matters squarely within their expertise,” a “daunting task,” seems to suggest that lawyers could too. But judges do not always agree on the admissibility of expertise, and discerning reliability has proved to be controversial. To expect attorneys—and this is what the proponents of a duty to vet experts expect—to do sufficient scientific research

At yesterday’s 5th Annual Federation of Asian Canadian Lawyers (FACL) Conference, Avvy Go and Julian Falconer spoke about mentorship and noted that large firms presumptively have resources that small and solo firms do not.

The future of legal practice management will invariably lie in technological solutions to strategic problems, especially for those with limited resources. I had a private tour earlier this week of the new LexisNexis product launched in Ontario, PCLaw Practice Suite, intended primarily for firms with 1 to 5 lawyers. The platform was developed after years of research and communication with small practitioners to assess . . . [more]

Libraries, and especially public libraries, are routinely an early target of budget cutting initiatives. It seems HR pros and other administrative types typically have not personally experienced how valuable sustained contact with high quality reading material is.

Where closing libraries is unpalatable, Librarians are fired. After all, the common perception of librarians is that “Librarians check out books. They read a lot. They tell people to be quiet.”

But libraries can’t run themselves, and more crucially, Librarians teach, by example and by the collections they build, how to detect BS. And lawyers, having spent a lot of time . . . [more]

How are hockey, poutine, and philosophy related?

The answer to this and all manner of other “connect the dots” sorts of questions is provided by xefer’s cunning use of Wikipedia. On the xefer-Wikipedia site, you simply enter one or more words or phrases, and provided that they’re Wikipedia article titles, xefer finds the paths in Wikipedia that will link up the concepts. The result is a map of logically related nodes each of which is an article title, making the whole look rather like a way finder for a subway system.

If you’re stumped for notions—and it’s surprising how empty . . . [more]

This is a post in a series to appear occasionally, setting out some articles, videos, podcasts and the like that contributors at Slaw are enjoying and that you might find interesting. The articles tend to be longer than blog posts and shorter than books, just right for that stolen half hour on the weekend. It’s also likely that most of them won’t be about law — just right for etc.

Please let us have your recommendations for what we and our readers might like.

Had we but world enough, and time,
This coyness, lady, were no crime.

I was going to discuss the implications of Steve Jobs hypothetically attending Law School, but it became too challenging, especially with deadlines. Besides, when an article concludes with a quote from Herman Hesse’s Steppenwolf, like everything to do with Steve, the bar has been raised. The title of The Guardian’s Jean-Louis Gassée article: Steve Jobs: who’s going to protect us from cheap and mediocre now? says a lot.

One result of Steve’s having gone to Law School is that we might have missed out on benefiting from . . . [more]