Research guides: Legal research: Legal Research Websites

Law and Legislation

Canada - Current Law

Consolidated Acts – Justice Laws Website This link opens in a new window
“The Justice Laws Website provides an official consolidation, or updated version, of the federal Acts and regulations maintained by the Department of Justice….” (Justice Laws) Site includes access to frequently requested Acts such as the Criminal Code, Youth Criminal justice Act, Privacy Act and the Access to Information Act.

Criminal Code (R.S. 1985, C-46) - Full text of the Code.

Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms - Full text of this document.

Parliament of Canada - Site contains links to bills, Senate, and House of Commons debates.

British Columbia – Current Law

BC Laws - Find information on federal legislation, including new and updated legislation.

Legislative Assembly of BC - Links to Bills (Legislation) and Hansard.

Canada – Proposed and In-process Legislation

LEGISinfo (Library of Parliament) - Find information on federal legislation currently before Parliament.

Parliament of Canada - Site contains links to bills, Senate, and House of Commons debates.

British Columbia – Proposed and In-process Legislation

BC Laws - Find information on federal legislation, including new and updated legislation.

Legislative Assembly of BC - Links to Bills (Legislation) and Hansard.

Research

ClickLaw - Provides the residents of British Columbia with access to general legal information.

Best Guide to Canadian Legal Research - Strategies and techniques for Canadian legal research, finding and using secondary sources, finding and analyzing cases, updating your research, legal writing, legal research FAQs".

BC Courthouse Library Society - Contains court rules and forms, legal research guides, and an A-Z Knowledgebase.

Findlaw - United States - Links to information on the US legal system.

National Library of Canada Subject Search - An information service developed by the Library and Archives Canada to provide links to information about Canada from internet resources around the world.

Legal Citation

Queen's University Library Legal Research - Includes quality resources related to legal citation and research.

A Neutral Citation Standard for Case Law - Citation standard "provides courts with a case naming method that does not depend on their publication in printed case law reports."

Case Law

Supreme Court of Canada decisions (Lexum collection)
Decisions from 1876-present.
Federal Court of Canada
Decisions from 1995-present.
Courts of British Columbia
Contains links to Reasons for Judgement from the BC Supreme Court, the Court of Appeal and Provincial Court.
CanLII: Canadian Legal Information Institute
Provides free access to Canadian full-text court decisions available on the web. Includes all Canadian provinces as well as the Federal Court of Canada.
Canadian Human Rights Tribunal
Canadian Human Rights Tribunal (CHRT) is similar to a court of law, but is less formal and only hears cases relating to discrimination. Site has full text of decisions.
BC Human Rights Tribunal
An independent, quasi-judicial body created by the B.C. Human Rights Code. The Tribunal is responsible for accepting, screening, mediating and adjudicating human rights complaints. Full text of decisions from January 1997 on.