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Home - Canadian e-Discovery Portal

Welcome to the Canadian e-Discovery Portal. Here you will find all the relevant documents and resources pertaining to e-discovery in Canada, including regularly updated case law digests.

News

2008-03-25 - The e-Discovery Reading List on the practicePRO website was updated.

2008-03-25 - The Canadian E-Discovery Case Law Digests (Common law) was updated.

2008-03-19 - IT.Can announces that the Supreme Court of Nova Scotia and the Nova Scotia Court of Appeal recently released tentative versions of the new Nova Scotia Civil Procedure Rules.

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The Sedona Canada Principles

>> First edition with full commentary (PDF)

Handout Version

Other formats: PDF, DOC

Addressing Electronic Discovery

• Principle 1: Electronically stored information is discoverable.
• Principle 2: In any proceeding, the parties should ensure that steps taken in the discovery process are proportionate, taking into account (i) the nature and scope of the litigation, including the importance and complexity of the issues, interest and amounts at stake; (ii) the relevance of the available electronically stored information; (iii) its importance to the court's adjudication in a given case; and (iv) the costs, burden and delay that may be imposed on the parties to deal with electronically stored information.
• Principle 3: As soon as litigation is reasonably anticipated, parties must consider their obligation to take reasonable and good faith steps to preserve potentially relevant electronically stored information.
• Principle 4: Counsel and parties should meet and confer as soon as practicable, and on an ongoing basis, regarding the identification, preservation, collection, review and production of electronically stored information.
• Principle 5: The parties should be prepared to produce relevant electronically stored information that is reasonably accessible in terms of cost and burden.
• Principle 6: A party should not be required, absent agreement or a court order based on demonstrated need and relevance, to search for or collect deleted or residual electronically stored information.
• Principle 7: A party may satisfy its obligation to preserve, coll ect, review and produce electronically stored information in good faith by using electronic tools and processes such as data sampling, searching or by using selection criteria to collect potentially relevant electronically stored information.
• Principle 8: Parties should agree as early as possible in the litigation process on the format in which electronically stored information will be produced. Parties should also agree on the format, content and organization of information to be exchanged in any required list of documents as part of the discovery process.
• Principle 9: During the discovery process parties should agree to or, if necessary, seek judicial direction on measures to protect privileges, privacy, trade secrets and other confidential information relating to the production of electronic documents and data.
• Principle 10: During the discovery process, parties should anticipate and respect the rules of the forum in which the litigation takes place, while appreciating the impact any decisions may have in related actions in other forums.
• Principle 11: Sanctions should be considered by the court where a party will be materially prejudiced by another party's failure to meet any obligation to preserve, collect, review or produce electronically stored information. The party in default may avoid sanctions if it demonstrates the failure was not intentional or reckless.
• Principle 12: The reasonable costs of preserving, collecting and reviewing electronically stored information will generally be borne by the party producing it. In limited circumstances, it may be appropriate for the parties to arrive at a different allocation of costs on an interim basis, by either agreement or court order.

Copyright © 2008, The Sedona Conference®. Reprinted courtesy of The Sedona Conference®. You can download a free copy of the complete document for your personal use.

Content Managers

• Peg Duncan, Department of Justice, Ottawa, Ontario
• Dominic Jaar, Bell Canada, Montreal, Quebec
• Dan Pinnington, LAWPRO, Toronto, Ontario
• Frédéric Pelletier, LexUM, Montreal, Quebec

Background

There is a growing awareness of the importance of what is now known as electronic discovery. Lawyers in all areas of practice, not just litigators, need to be aware of electronic discovery, and the implications that electronic documents have in their respective practices and practice areas.

>> learn more about e-Discovery Canada

e-Discovery Digests

• Canadian E-Discovery Case Law Digests (Common law)
• Canadian E-Discovery Case Law Digests (Civil law - Quebec)

Related Resources

• E-Discovery Guidelines and Resources Page (Discovery Task Force, Ontario)
• E-Discovery in Canada (M. Felsky)
• E-Discovery Issue of LAWPRO Magazine (September 2005)
• E-Discovery Reading List (Practice Pro)
• Electronic Evidence Project (B.C. Courts)
• Making and responding to e-discovery requests (LawPRO Magazine)
• Model e-discovery precedents (EIC, Ontario)