Your Guide to Canadian Law: 1,000 Answers to the Most Frequently Asked Questions; Second Edition

Alexander David Kurke is a criminal lawyer in Sudbury, Ontario.

In this book, the authors comprehensively explain almost every area of Canadian law in a useful and comprehensible way. The answers that find their way into the book were generated on Legal Line, a telephone/fax/internet service founded by Antree C. Demakos in 1993. More than 300 lawyers contributed their expertise to the project, which also received assistance from other professionals and a host of organizations, associations, and government agencies. A fold-out, poster-sized flyer with Legal Line information and contact information for other agencies is an unexpected plus.

However, the book makes no claims to comprehensive “expertise,” and does not offer legal “advice.” Rather, its usefulness lies in its creation of a framework of various areas and issues in the law. The curious will find enlightenment from the framework alone. Those facing real legal problems will learn how to focus their attention into, or seek more specialized advice about, their own particular issue.

A complete summary of topics would not be possible, but the book is subdivided into logical sections: Getting Justice (procedural issues), Relationships (family law), Money Matters (investing, insurance, and tax), Taking Care of Business (including employment issues and workers’ compensation), Crime and Punishment, and Life Matters (including immigration, discrimination, wills and estate planning, and powers of attorney).

The opening pages of the Crime and Punishment section will give a flavour of the whole. The authors first discuss the important distinction among Summary Conviction, Indictable, and hybrid offences. The next topics deal with being stopped, questioned, and searched by police, and police entry and search of one’s home. There follow questions and answers about being charged and arrested, what rights a person has upon arrest, and bail. For those who might disagree with the explanations that are offered, or argue that they are too simplistic, it must be noted that, on average, once every page the reader is urged to contact a lawyer to assist in navigating these perilous waters.

This is a book that is loaded with information in a very accessible format. Every household should have a copy as a reference text.