I posted recently about Canada’s new anti-spam law, mentioning the challenges that the CRTC would face in implementing it. The CRTC has established a complaints mechanism which can be accessed via its website.  Have a look here. It is proving popular: more than 1,000 complaints were received in the first week. By the end of […] Read more

The European Court of Justice’s recent ‘Right to be Forgotten‘ ruling has caused much ink to be spilled. Despite the significant criticism it has received, I think the decision was quite sensible, for reasons given here by Eric Posner. It continues to provoke interesting commentary. Consider the following description of the problem from Babak Siavoshy […] Read more

A tragic accident occurred in Seaworld, Orlando in 2010. A trainer interacting with Tilikum, a killer whale, was dragged underwater and killed. An investigation by the Occupational Health and Safety Authority ensued. Seaworld was found to have violated the duty to provide a safe workplace and lost its challenge to the order made pursuant to […] Read more

The UK Supreme Court decided an important case on the law of nuisance last week: Coventry v. Lawrence, [2014] UKSC 13. One of the many important issues was whether planning permission is a defence to an action in nuisance.In his leading judgment, Lord Neuberger held that it is not: The grant of planning permission for […] Read more

The Supreme Court of Canada this morning waded into the mire of the “economic torts”, a grab bag of common law causes of action that impose liability for (primarily) nasty behaviour in the marketplace. Up for discussion in A.I. Enterprises Ltd. v. Bram Enterprises Ltd., 2014 SCC 12 was the “unlawful means” tort, though as […] Read more

There was a long piece in the New York Times last week about Britain’s eager adoption of the approach to regulation and law reform set out by Richard Thaler and Cass Sunstein in Nudge: Britain’s Ministry of Nudges. Here is an extract: It is an American idea, refined in American universities and popularized in 2008 […] Read more

On May 10 next, we at U de M are hosting what we hope will be the first in a series of conferences on key concepts of the common law. To kick off, the conference on May 10, 2013 is Regulation and the Common Law. Our keynote speaker will be Gillian Metzger, the Stanley H. […] Read more

If you walk through the city centre streets of Montreal, you could well be walking along any street in North America, such is the predominance of big-name brands. This has long been a bone of contention for Quebeckers. Protest marches are not uncommon. Symbolically, the issue is of great importance, all the more so given […] Read more

The Manitoba Court of Appeal, in London Limos v. Unicity Taxi Ltd., 2012 MBCA 75, recently discussed whether market participants in regulated industries have any procedural rights when new companies apply to enter the market. The answer in this case was some, but not many. London Limos applied to the provincial Taxicab Board for licences […] Read more

A helpful way to keep up with recent legal developments in Canada is to follow the output of the country’s leading law firms.From Fraser Milner Casgrain comes a nice note on a decision of the British Columbia Court of Appeal involving an investigation by the tax authorities. As the Court explained in R. v. He, […] Read more