Statistics Canada Report on Sexual Misconduct in the Canadian Armed Forces

Stratistics Canada released a report earlier this week on Sexual Misconduct in the Canadian Armed Forces, 2016:

"From April to June, 2016, active Regular Force and Primary Reserve members were invited to complete an electronic questionnaire asking about their experiences and perceptions of inappropriate sexualized behaviour, discrimination on the basis of sex, sexual orientation, or gender identity, and sexual assault within the Canadian Armed Forces. This included seeing, hearing or experiencing these types of behaviours within the military workplace, or outside the military workplace but involving other military members or Department of Defence employees or contractors. Responses were received from over 43,000 active members of the Canadian Armed Forces, including members of the Regular Force and Primary Reserve."

Among the highlights:

• In the past 12 months, just under 1,000 Regular Force members of the Canadian Armed Forces, or 1.7%, were victims of sexual assault (i.e., sexual attacks, unwanted sexual touching, or sexual activity to which the victim is unable to consent, which occurred in the military workplace or involving military members, Department of National Defence employees, or contractors). Unwanted sexual touching was the most common form of sexual assault, reported by 1.5% of Regular Force members.
• Women in the Regular Force were more likely than men to be sexually assaulted (4.8% versus 1.2%) in the past 12 months.
• Half (49%) of women who were victims of sexual assault in the past 12 months identified their supervisor or someone of a higher rank as the perpetrator. For male victims, a peer was most commonly the perpetrator (56%).
• Among Regular Force members, 27.3% of women and 3.8% of men have been victims of sexual assault at least once since joining the Canadian Armed Forces. More specifically, 24.0% of women and 3.4% of men in the Regular Force have been victims of unwanted sexual touching, the most common type of sexual assault.
• Four in five (79%) members of the Regular Force saw, heard, or were personally targeted by sexualized behaviour in the military workplace or involving other military members, Department of National Defence employees, or contractors, within the past 12 months.
•  Sexual jokes were the most common type of sexualized behaviour in the workplace, seen, heard, or experienced by 76% of Regular Force members. Of those who reported sexual jokes in the workplace, almost half (46%) stated that they occurred ten or more times in the past 12 months.
• One-third (34%) of Regular Force members saw, heard, or experienced discriminatory behaviour in the workplace in the past 12 months. This discrimination most typically took the form of suggestions that people do not act like men or women are supposed to act (22%).
• Close to one in five (17%) Regular Force members were personally targeted by sexualized or discriminatory behaviour in the past 12 months. Women were twice as likely as men to report being personally targeted by sexualized or discriminatory behaviour in the workplace or involving military members (31% versus 15%).

ABA Journal 10th Annual Blawg 100 List

The ABA Journal has released its 10th annual list of "the 100 most compelling" law-related blogs, otherwise known as the Blawg 100.

It has also published an article on What bloggers told us about the state of the legal blogosphere.

2015-16 Annual Report of the Library of Parliament

The annual report of the Library of Parliament for 2015-2016 is available.

The Library, which provides research and information services to Canada's federal parliamentarians, produces many documents that are also very useful to the law librarian community, including HillNotes (blog-style overviews of important and emerging issues), in-depth background papers, and legislative summaries of bills before Parliament.

Action Committee on Access to Justice in Civil and Family Matters Survey

The Canadian Forum on Civil Justice (CFCJ) will lead a major project to publish a Status Report on the State of Access to Justice in Canada on behalf of the Action Committee on Access to Justice in Civil and Family Matters.

The Action Committee was convened 2008 by the Rt. Honourable Beverley McLachlin, Chief Justice of Canada, to bring together stakeholders interested in improving access to civil and family justice in Canada.

As a first step in the project, the  CFCJ is conducting a survey of access to justice organizations.

Statistics Canada Article on Homicide in Canada, 2015

The Statistics Canada publication Juristat has published an article on Homicide in Canada, 2015.

Among the highlights:

• Canadian police services reported 604 homicides in 2015, 83 more than the previous year. The homicide rate increased by 15% in 2015 to 1.68 per 100,000 population, the highest rate since 2011.
• The higher number of homicides for 2015 was primarily due to increases in Alberta (+27 homicides), Saskatchewan (+19) and Ontario (+18).
• One-quarter (25%) of the 604 homicide victims were reported by police as an Aboriginal person. As well, 33% of accused persons identified in solved cases were reported as an Aboriginal person. Overall, Aboriginal people accounted for about 5% of Canada's population in 2015.

Presentations from Last Week's LITA Forum on Library Tech

LITA (Library Information Technology Association, a division of the American Library Association) organized a forum last week in Fort Worth, Texas.

The Forum is an annual gathering for technology-minded information professionals.

Many of the presentations and handouts have been published online on the conference wiki.

Supreme Court of Canada Calendar of Upcoming Hearings

The Supreme Court of Canada has published its calendar of appeal hearings for the period November 28 to December 9, 2016.

To find out more about any particular case, the Court's website has a section that allows users to find docket information, case summaries as well as facta from the parties. All you need to do is click on a case name.

American Association of Law Libraries Webinar on Taming the E-Mail Beast

The American Association of Law Libraries is hosting a webinar on December 15, 2016 on Taming the E-Mail Beast: Key Strategies for Managing E-Mail:

"Every day, managers and professionals are getting buried under a continuing stream of both useful and useless e-mail. Without a system for getting 'control of the beast', professionals spend much of their work (and personal) time spinning wheels and feeling highly unsatisfied. Learn a proven system for taming your email account, with strategies for keeping your inbox efficient and under control by building and administering a personal 'email infrastructure'. Learn how to get rid of all those 'quick little' emails once and for all, as well as how to mitigate or even eliminate much of that annoying junk and spam. Learn several key technical tips for better managing your email using market-leading software. Finally feel on top of your email and related activities, rather than feeling it is on top of you."

Registration costs $60 (US) for non-members.

Five Questions with Linda Keddy

The Canadian Association of Law Libraries (CALL) has been running a series of member profiles called Five Questions With...

The most recent interview is with Linda Keddy, Director of Research at the law firm Pink Larkin.

Another interesting profile series consists of interviews by the Law Library of Congress in Washington with members of its staff.

Launch of National Database of Professionals Assisting Self-Represented Litigants

The National Self-Represented Litigants Project (NSRLP)  has launched a National Database of Professionals Assisting SRLs that seeks to link Canadians without legal representation with legal professionals willing to offer them individualized assistance.

As explained in a November 14, 2016 blog post:

"This is an initiative that we have been working on since last spring, slowly coaxing lawyers and others to step forward and become part of the National Database so that clients can find them. Before that, since its inception in 2013 NSRLP has promoted the idea of unbundled legal services, legal coaching, the use of paralegals where appropriate, and relevant assistance by other professionals via this blog, countless speeches to law societies and bar associations, and media interviews promoting affordable legal services for the primarily self-represented."

The NSRLP comes out of the work of the University of Windsor's Dr. Julie Macfarlaneand is a a clearinghouse for information and resources related to the phenomenon of self-represented litigants.

Supreme Court of Canada: New Library Titles

The list of new library titles added to the Supreme Court of Canada collection for the period of November 1st to 15th, 2016 is now available on the Court website.

It is possible to subscribe via e-mail to receive the list.

Oxford Dictionaries Word of the Year : "Post-Truth”

For its Word of the Year 2016, Oxford Dictionaries has selected "post-truth.", an adjective defined as ‘relating to or denoting circumstances in which objective facts are less influential in shaping public opinion than appeals to emotion and personal belief’:

"The concept of post-truth has been simmering for the past decade, but Oxford shows the word spiking in frequency this year in the context of the Brexit referendum in the UK and the presidential election in the US, and becoming associated overwhelmingly with a particular noun, in the phrase post-truth politics."

Runners-up for the word of the year in 2016 included:

• adulting, n. [mass noun] informal the practice of behaving in a way characteristic of a responsible adult, especially the accomplishment of mundane but necessary tasks.
• alt-right, n. (in the US) an ideological grouping associated with extreme conservative or reactionary viewpoints, characterized by a rejection of mainstream politics and by the use of online media to disseminate deliberately controversial content. 
• Brexiteer, n. British informal a person who is in favour of the United Kingdom withdrawing from the European Union.
• chatbot, n. a computer program designed to simulate conversation with human users, especially over the Internet.
• coulrophobia, n. [mass noun] rare extreme or irrational fear of clowns.
• glass cliff,  n. used with reference to a situation in which a woman or member of a minority group ascends to a leadership position in challenging circumstances where the risk of failure is high.
• hygge, n. [mass noun] a quality of cosiness and comfortable conviviality that engenders a feeling of contentment or well-being (regarded as a defining characteristic of Danish culture):
• Latinx, n. (plural Latinxs or same) and adj. a person of Latin American origin or descent (used as a gender-neutral or non-binary alternative to Latino or Latina); relating to people of Latin American origin or descent (used as a gender-neutral or non-binary alternative to Latino or Latina).
• woke, adj. (woker, wokest) US informal alert to injustice in society, especially racism.

Presentations Now Available from Recent ARL Library Assessment Conference

The Association of Research Libraries (ARL) recently hosted a Library Assessment Conference conference in Arlington, Virginia.

ARL members include 124 research libraries at comprehensive, research institutions in the US and Canada.

Many of the conference presentations are now available online.

Statisrics Canada Article on Prostitution Offences in Canada

The Statistics Canada publication Juristat recently published an article entitled Prostitution offences in Canada: Statistical trends that looks at police-reported prostitution-related offences in Canada, between 2009 and 2014.

It also examines homicides of sex workers, and criminal court outcomes for prostitution-related cases.

Among the highlights:

• Between 2009 and 2014, the period prior to the introduction of new legislation that made it illegal to purchase sexual services, there were 16,879 prostitution incidents reported by police in Canada. These incidents represented less than 0.1% of all crimes reported in Canada in the same time period.
• In 2014, there were 3.0 police-reported prostitution offences per 100,000 population, the lowest rate since 1982.
• The majority of prostitution offences (82%) reported between 2009 and 2014 were for communicating or attempting to communicate with a person for the purpose of engaging in or obtaining sexual services.
• Close to half (43%) of persons accused of a prostitution-related offence between 2009 and 2014 were female, compared with less than one quarter (23%) of persons accused of any offence overall during the same time period. Females accused of prostitution were much younger than males (median age of 31 versus 42).
• Repeated contact with police for prostitution-related offences was more frequent among female accused (27%) compared with male accused (3%).
• Between 1991 and 2014, there were 294 homicides of sex workers. One in three (34%) homicides of sex workers remained unsolved; a much greater proportion than for homicides that did not involve a sex worker victim (20%).
• Between 2008/2009 and 2013/2014, under one third (30%) of prostitution cases processed in criminal courts resulted in a guilty verdict; this was much lower than the proportion for criminal court cases in general (64%).

Canadian Forum on Civil Justice October 2016 Access to Justice Newsletter

The non-profit Canadian Forum on Access to Justice (CFCJ) publishes a monthly newsletter about Access to Justice.

The latest issue of the newsletter includes:

• news about the "Everyday Legal Problems and the Cost of Justice in Canada: Overview Report"
• links to a paper on "Nudging the Paradigm Shift, Everyday Legal Problems in Canada"
• and more

SirsiDynix Webinar - A Conversation with Library Tech Expert Marshall Breeding

Library technology company SirsiDynix is hosting an online Conversation with Marshall Breeding on December 7, 2016 at 1PM Eastern:

"Movements like the push toward next-generation automated library systems and Linked Data are all shifting the landscape of library solutions. Want to know what’s coming down the pike? Ask Marshall!"

"Join Eric Keith, SirsiDynix Chief Marketing Officer, for a conversation with Marshall Breeding, the creator and editor of Library Technology Guides. Learn where the field of library technology is going in this Q&A-style webinar in which Eric Keith will ask Marshall your questions."

Breeding is a well-known library tech expert who edits the Library Technology Guides website and produces the annual International Library Automation Perceptions Surveys.

Amendments to the Rules of the Supreme Court of Canada

Amendments to the Rules of the Supreme Court of Canada were published last week in the Canada Gazette Part II.

They will come into force on January 1, 2017.

The amendments include a new process for giving notice when an appeal raises a constitutional issue, as well as new deadlines for serving and filing appeal documents.  An online Guide exists to help explain the changes.

The existing version of the Rules is available on the Justice Canada website.

Updated Research Guides From GlobaLex

GlobaLex, the electronic collection created by the Hauser Global Law School Program at the New York University School of Law, recently updated some of its research guides:

• Researching the United Nations: Finding the Organization's Internal Resource Trails: "The United Nations is such a massive organization that its wide array of processes and products require enough reference sources to warrant a map and compass for navigation. As a map, here are suggested search techniques for several standard types of queries and, as a compass, here are the U.N.'s many diverse search tools organized into resource types." 
• European Union Legal Materials: An Infrequent User’s Guide: "This guide is intended for the researcher who infrequently needs to research European Union (EU) law or related materials or to locate EU official documents. The expert or experienced researcher should consult the research guides listed at the end of this article for more detailed information on EU legal materials. With the addition of Croatia in 2013, the EU has a population of approximately 508 million people comprising twenty-eight European nations. The EU gross domestic product has a value of nearly U.S. $18.5 trillion, a bit larger than the U.S. economy. Because the EU is a major trading partner with the United States, knowledge of EU law will become more widespread as this organization takes a more prominent role in international trade and international affairs generally. Even the law library that does not consider international law a strength of its collection will occasionally have to meet the needs of patrons seeking to locate information on EU law."
• Comparative Criminal Procedure: A Select Bibliography:"This bibliography lists selected English-language resources on comparative criminal procedure. It focuses on journal articles, book chapters, and treatises covering comparative criminal procedure generally, criminal procedure in multiple jurisdictions, and specialized research topics in comparative criminal procedure such as: arrest, pre-trial detention, interrogation, right to counsel, legal assistance for indigent defendants, discovery, plea bargaining, trial by jury, the privilege against self-incrimination, inquisitorial versus accusatorial systems, role of prosecutors, judges and defense attorneys, cross-examination, exclusionary rules, sentencing, death penalty, criminal appeals, and double jeopardy. A few comparative international criminal procedure titles are included."

Library and Archives Canada Releases Digitized Royal Commission on Aboriginal Peoples Documents

Last week, Library and Archives Canada (LAC) released  more than 600 digitized documents from the Royal Commission on Aboriginal Peoples:

"Established in 1991, the Royal Commission on Aboriginal Peoples (RCAP) travelled across Canada documenting the issues and challenges facing Indigenous Canadians and their communities. Over its six-year mandate, RCAP amassed thousands of hours of recorded testimony and hundreds of thousands of pages of documents, culminating in the publication of the 1996 RCAP final report complete with a series of recommendations for a renewed relationship between Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal people in Canada (...)"

"LAC launched a searchable database of select RCAP records at the commemorative national forum. The database contains transcripts of more than 175 days of hearings; nearly 200 research reports; more than 100 submissions from tribal councils, organizations and interest groups; as well as RCAP publications and the final report."

White Paper on Defining ROI: Law Library Best Practices

The American Association of Law Libraries (AALL) has released a white paper entitled Defining ROI: Law Library Best Practices.

In an e-mail message to AALL mmbers, the association's president Ronald E. Wheeler introduces the document:

"Today's legal market demands that legal information professionals identify, measure, and communicate the benchmarks and metrics of value. AALL members who served as authors have mined their own experiences to share their measures for success, creating engaging and practical guides for defining ROI. The articles draw from renowned historical sources such as the Five Laws of Library Science by S. R. Ranganathan, as well as highlight the contemporary knowledge of Don Draper, the iconic fictional '60s ad man from the TV show Mad Men. The goal of this white paper is to spark creativity and innovation for measuring value within the profession."

November 2016 Issue of In Session: Canadian Association of Law Libraries' e-Newsletter

The November 2016 issue of In Session is available online.

It is the monthly e-newsletter of the Canadian Association of Law Libraries (CALL) and contains news from CALL committees and special interest groups, member updates and events.

Nominations for the Next Hugh Lawford Award for Excellence in Legal Publishing Due Feb 17, 2016

The Canadian Association of Law Libraries (CALL) is accepting nominations for the next Hugh Lawford Award for Excellence in Legal Publishing.

It honours a publisher (whether for-profit or not-for profit, corporate or non-corporate) that has demonstrated excellence by publishing a work, series, website or e-product that makes a significant contribution to legal research and scholarship.

Members as well as non-members of CALL can make nominations. Nominations can be submitted to Annette Demers, Past CALL President, until February 17, 2017. She can be reached at lawlibrarian AT uwindsor.ca.

The award honours Hugh Lawford (1933-2009), Professor of Law at Queens’ University and the founder of Quicklaw.

Maritime Law Book to Relaunch

Earlier this year, Fredericton-based legal publisher Maritime Law Book (MLB) announced that it was closing its doors. MLB is known for its regional and national case law reporters and its Key Number system for assigning legal topics to cases.

Earlier today, Eric Appleby, MLB CEO and Colin Lachance, CEO of 9766758 Canada Inc. and former CEO of the Canadian Legal Information Institute (CanLII), published a press release announcing that MLB "will shortly re-launch with a world-class legal information processing engine that leverages cutting edge natural language process technology to make research easier and more efficient."

Supreme Court of Canada: New Library Titles

The list of new library titles added to the Supreme Court of Canada collection for the period October 16th to 31st, 2016 is now available on the Court website.

It is possible to subscribe via e-mail to receive the list.