In February: be connected, stay savvy

21 February 2017 – February, as the month of Family Day and Valentine’s Day, is a time of celebrating family, love and companionship. 14-year old Vancouver resident Elodie Doumenc felt sad that she could not spend time on Family Day with her grandmother, Alexandra, who lives in France, and is unable to communicate with her family because of advanced Parkinson’s disease. “I think she must be feeling very lonely,” the 8th-grader says. Realizing that many Read more…

Manitoba Law Reform Commission Releases Final Report on Improving the Small Claims System

The Manitoba Law Reform Commission released its final report, Improving the Small Claims System in Manitoba, as part of the commission’s larger project on Access to Courts and Court Processes.  The final report contains the commission’s eleven recommendations for reform of the province’s Small Claims process. Background of the Project In March 2012, the commission released an Issue Paper to discuss some of the factors impacting access to justice in the province.  Among the issues Read more…

Informed health care consent, aging and dementia: making it happen

January was Alzheimer Awareness Month, making it a great time for the Canadian Centre for Elder Law (CCEL) to launch a new project that seeks to help people living with dementia better understand their right to consent to health care treatment and medication. In collaboration with the Alzheimer Society of B.C., the CCEL is reviewing the law, policy and practice of health care consent, with the ultimate goal of making recommendations for improvements in this area. Read more…

Government of Canada Reinstates Court Challenges Program

On February 7, 2017, in a joint news release from the Department of Canadian Heritage and the Department of Justice Canada, the Court Challenges Program (“CCP”) was reinstated.  With an annual budget of $5 million, the goal of the CCP is to “better reflect changes in the Canadian jurisprudence by expanding the scope of eligible rights to sections of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms (the “Charter”) relating to fundamental freedoms, democratic rights, life, Read more…

CBABC’s Agenda for Justice and BCLI’s Financing Litigation Legal Research Project

On February 1, 2017, the BC Branch of the Canadian Bar Association (CBABC) released its report, An Agenda for Justice (PDF), containing more than 30 recommendations for reform to strengthen and improve access to justice in British Columbia. The report calls for corrective action by the province in four key areas to address issues of both hardship and uncertainty faced by people who engage with the justice system today. Those key areas are: Effective Access Read more…