Last week’s decision of the European Court of Justice in Schrems v. Data Protection Commissioner, C-362/14 deemed invalid an important self-certification regime for companies transferring personal data to the United States from the European Union. Several aspects of the decision are of general interest. Schrems is an Austrian student who, like most of us, has […] Read more

In a remarkable decision yesterday, the Supreme Court of Canada struck down British Columbia’s regime of court fees as unconstitutional: Trial Lawyers Association of British Columbia v. British Columbia (Attorney General), 2014 SCC 59. A litigant was faced with a $3,600 bill for scheduling a 10-day trial. She could not pay the court fees — […] Read more

There are two interesting aspects to Université McGill c. Ong, 2014 QCCA 458, a technical aspect about administrative-law doctrine and a substantive aspect about access to administrative justice. O was an employee of McGill University until she was dismissed for mishandling cash and impeding an investigation into missing funds. She vigorously contested the dismissal before […] Read more

This morning’s Supreme Court of Canada decision in AIC Limited v. Fischer, 2013 SCC 69 involved an application of the “preferable procedure” test for certification of class actions to a case in which the Ontario Securities Commission reached a settlement with mutual fund managers about the controversial practice of “market timing“. The question for the […] Read more