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October 19, 2026
Justice Minister Sean Fraser has announced two judicial appointments in Ontario: Justice Julie Audet, currently a judge of the Superior Court of Justice’s Family Court in Ottawa, has been appointed regional senior judge for the East Region. Gabrielle M.S. Beaulieu, founder of Orbis - Beaulieu Professional Corporation in Ottawa, has been appointed to the Superior Court’s Family Court in Ottawa.
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October 16, 2026
For the first time, the Supreme Court of Canada has explained when and how the Criminal Code’s s. 276 rules limiting the admissibility and use of evidence of complainants’ sexual history apply in prosecutions for non-enumerated sexual exploitation crimes, such as human trafficking and selling “sexual services.”
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October 16, 2026
Appeal by SB from a decision determining parenting arrangements for the parties’ child. KB left Saltcoats with the child under the pretext of visiting family in Saskatoon. She did not return with the child to Saltcoats thereafter.
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October 15, 2026
Appeal by SP from the dismissal of her contempt application, and an order imputing annual income to CP. The judge rejected CP’s allegation she was unable to work more than two days per week.
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October 14, 2026
Alexander Holburn Beaudin + Lang LLP (Alexander Holburn) has launched a family law group in Vancouver with the addition of partners Jane Reid and Rosemary Gallo.
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October 14, 2026
In this case, the Divisional Court upheld the housing rights of a tenant who is a survivor of intimate partner violence. The tenants in this case were a married couple, Denise Browne and Ricky Browne, who had two children. They resided in the rented unit for more than 10 years.
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October 13, 2026
Only two women applied for the latest Supreme Court of Canada vacancy, filled by Manitoba’s Glenn Joyal, whose appointment last June restored a 5-4 male majority, ending the high court’s first female majority on the top bench.
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October 13, 2026
Last week, the federal government announced that it plans to introduce legislation to decriminalize advance requests for medical assistance in dying (MAID), leaving each province and territory to decide whether to permit them. Advance requests are intended to respect autonomy, but when undue influence, coercive control or other forms of abuse are discovered only after MAID has been provided, no remedy can restore the person’s life.
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October 09, 2026
The Supreme Court of Canada has explained how three Criminal Code sentencing provisions should interact and be interpreted when both the victim and offender are Indigenous, and how sentencing circles fit into the mix. On Oct. 9, the top court split 5-4 to dismiss the Nova Scotia Crown’s appeal from a majority Nova Scotia Court of Appeal decision that reduced the five-year sentence a provincial court judge imposed on respondent Harry Arthur Cope to three years (less remand credit of 18 months): R. v. Cope, 2026 SCC 32.
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October 08, 2026
British Columbia Chief Judge Melissa Gillespie has announced the appointment of Matthew Turnell, Manpreet Mand and David Jenkins as provincial court judges.
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October 08, 2026
Every family lawyer has heard a client say, “I don’t care what it costs. I just want to win.” The recent costs ruling in Perera v. Perera, 2026 ONSC 5206 is what “winning” looks like.
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October 07, 2026
Federal Justice Minister Sean Fraser says the Liberal majority government will introduce “in weeks” groundbreaking legislation to permit persons with serious medical conditions to consent in advance to medical assistance in dying (MAID), i.e. before they lose their capacity to consent to the procedure. The planned bill would also bar MAID access on an “indeterminate basis” to persons whose sole underlying medical condition is a mental illness, he said.
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October 06, 2026
Manitoba is looking to remove limitation periods for civil claims stemming from intimate partner violence involving “coercive control.” According to an Oct. 5 news release, the province has introduced legislative amendments to its Limitations Act that “would allow survivors to pursue civil action regardless of when the abuse occurred.”
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October 06, 2026
Criminal court judges must remember that instructing a jury about evidence of fabrication is to be done only for the accused — not a complainant, says the lawyer of a man who maintains his ex-wife trumped up assault claims against him to gain an edge in their divorce.
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October 06, 2026
Intergenerational estate freezes have long served as a bedrock mechanism for Canadian business owners seeking to defer tax and shelter wealth across generations. For years, corporate planners and family litigators assumed that routing future growth through a post-marriage discretionary family trust would cloak that interest as an excluded “gift after marriage” under Ontario’s Family Law Act (FLA).
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October 05, 2026
Canada needs to find new ways to sustain and strengthen its democratic institutions, especially to drive home to Canadians how much their independent justice system benefits them in their daily lives, top jurists say. At the Oct. 5 ceremonial opening of the Supreme Court of Canada’s judicial year in Ottawa, Chief Justice of Canada Richard Wagner told the audience of lawyers and judges he appreciated that “across the country, I’ve seen many of you speak out publicly to reiterate the importance of the rule of law and of an independent judiciary.”
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October 05, 2026
Saskatchewan has appointed its first associate judges to the Court of King’s Bench following legislation that came into force Oct. 1.
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October 05, 2026
Federal Justice Minister Sean Fraser has announced the appointment of eight judges in Ontario.
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October 05, 2026
Since the Supreme Court decision in Ahluwalia v. Ahluwalia, 2026 SCC 16, my calendar has been quite busy with in-person court attendances, law association events and CPD programs.
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October 02, 2026
The Supreme Court’s fall session is packed with interesting appeals in diverse areas of law including class actions, contracts, Crown immunity and Charter rights. The top court’s session begins Oct. 5 with an “opening of the court” ceremony in the West Memorial Building at 344 Wellington Street in Ottawa.
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October 02, 2026
Appeal by William from an order holding that he was unjustly enriched and other findings. William and Shelley were in a three-and-one-half-year common law relationship.
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October 01, 2026
The British Columbia Court of Appeal has upheld an oppression finding against a family company, ruling that a shareholder’s limited expectations while her father controlled the business did not restrict her entitlement to equitable treatment after her brother assumed control.
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October 01, 2026
Hafeez A. Khan has been appointed a judge of the Court of King’s Bench of Manitoba, Family Division, in Winnipeg.
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October 01, 2026
Mental health, job stress and keeping up with AI remain “front of mind” for the new president of Manitoba’s law society.
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October 01, 2026
Every fall, I hear some version of the same call. Two parents who spent the summer managing around each other, sometimes well, sometimes barely, suddenly find themselves in open conflict over a decision that has to be made right now: which school a child is registered at, which parent signs the form, whether an extracurricular activity happens on a day that falls outside the regular schedule. On the surface, it looks like a dispute about a single decision. It rarely is.