LexisNexis' third series of online legal research webinars especially designed for NZLS members, will focus on the Linxplus and CaseBase databases.

Linxplus is a joint venture between LexisNexis and the New Zealand Law Society.
It is a New Zealand online caselaw research tool of over 100,000 case summaries of judgments, with over 70,000 associated PDF's. Coverage of the courts ranges from the Supreme Court to the Weathertight Homes Tribunal. All higher court judgments are added to Linxplus, while only important lower court material is selected for addition. Linxplus also indexes journal articles from all major New Zealand law journals and reviews, as well as journals from other Commonwealth jurisdictions (over 100,000 records).

CaseBase is an Australian case citator and annotator of cases from over 60 Australian and overseas report series and of unreported decisions of the High Court, the Federal Court and the Supreme Courts of all Australian states and territories and other selected jurisdictions. Along with the details of the case, Casebase also provides a guide to how the case has been subsequently considered. CaseBase is also an excellent bibliographic reference, with catchworded and annotated article entries covering over 100 Australian and overseas legal journals.

Webinar dates to choose from are: 
28th May at 11am
30th May at 1pm
31st May at 3pm

Take part in this training from the convenience of your own desk. All you need is access to the Internet, and a telephone. Instructions on what to expect will be sent when you register.

How to join
To attend the Webinar simply email LexisNexis trainer with the subject heading ‘NZLS LexisNexis Webinar’. You will receive a confirmation email with details of how to sign in prior to the start of the session.

A list of books purchased by the Library in March is now available. The list provides a link for each title to the corresponding NZLS catalogue record, showing where the book is held.

A list of books purchased by the Library in March is now available. The list provides a link for each title to the corresponding NZLS catalogue record, showing where the book is held.

A web version of the New Zealand Official Yearbooks from 1893-2008 is now available on the Statistics New Zealand website.

Since 1893, New Zealand's Official Yearbooks have captured the stories of New Zealand in words and in numbers. The Yearbooks are an incredibly rich one-stop-shop for data and information from across government. Information is included on diverse topics from fisheries to friendly societies and prices to poetry.

Each yearbook can be searched individually using ctrl/f for PCs and laptops  and search within page for smart phones and tablets. Tables can be copied and pasted into other programmes, including Word and Excel.

2010 will be available shortly, with the same searchability as earlier years. Tables in the 2010 yearbook can pasted into Word, but not Excel.

The AtoJs Online website has been updated, increasing the online coverage of the Appendices of the Journal of the House of Representatives. 

The new content includes over 50 volumes donated by the Alexander Turnbull Library, the Hocken Collections, the Parliamentary Library and the University of Canterbury. 

It has filled all known gaps and brought the online collection up to 1914 (except two volumes that are being processed and will be added soon) 

One more content release is expected to be made before June, which will bring the online collection up to 1930, and also include all three volumes of the Votes and Proceedings, which have been scanned with assistance of the Office of the Clerk, and are being processed now.

A list of books purchased by the Library in January is now available. The list provides a link for each title to the corresponding NZLS catalogue record, showing where the book is held.

The NZLS Library service has compiled a list of insurance resources - texts, online resources and selected insurance case head notes and citations. It is intended that this will provide a useful starting point for research in insurance matters arising from the earthquakes. The list is not exhaustive, and further research may be required depending on individual circumstances. All resources are available through the New Zealand Law Society Library Service.

Lawyers can download the list from the Canterbury EQ support page in my.lawsociety.

To request a copy of a case or for further information contact the NZLS Library Service.

Text records and further resources can be found on the NZLS Library Catalogue.

 The New Zealand Law Society Library, Auckland  will be closing for the holiday break on 23 December 2011 and reopening on 4 January 2012. Staffed hours will be limited during January from 8.30am to 5pm.

The Wellington Library will close on 22 December 2011 and the Canterbury Library will close on 23 December 2011.
Both the Wellington and Canterbury libraries will reopen on Monday 9 January 2012.

The Library staff wish all practitioners a happy and safe holiday season and prosperous 2012.

The second edition of the highly successful New Zealand Law Style Guide will be published in December. The first edition, published in 2009, has quickly become the standard for the citation of New Zealand legal material.    

The second edition aims to build on the success of the first edition by:
• Providing new or expanded rules for a range of material not included in the first edition;
• Clarifying rules, including the cross referencing rules; and
• Simplifying the rules relating to the citation of international material.
Some sections have been rewritten and reordered to make them easier to understand.  As a result the Guide is much more user-friendly and the new edition is essential for anyone who has to cite legal materials. It is intended that there will be no further editions until 2017 at the earliest.

The new edition of the  Guide will be able to be accessed online through the website of the New Zealand Law Foundation, by the end of January 2012.  The New Zealand Law Foundation supported the production of the first edition and owns the copyright to the Guide.
Hard copies can be purchased from Thomson Reuters at $19 + GST ($21.85 incl GST) from mid -December.

Library staff are still unable to return to the Law Library in the Durham Street Courts building in Christchurch.

While engineers’ reports have recently declared the ‘tower’ in the Courts building safe for Ministry of Justice staff to re-enter, unfortunately the Law Library which adjoins the tower, requires ground stabilisation and structural strengthening before re-entry work can begin.

The necessary repair work will start sometime in the New Year with no further timeframe available at this stage.

Library staff have had controlled access to retrieve items from the collection since the February earthquake, however this access may become more restricted as remedial work is carried out. Meanwhile Library staff will continue to provide all Library services from a temporary site at 8 Homersham Place, Burnside.

Core texts and loose-leaf services have been relocated to the temporary location and a computer is available for practitioners to access Library electronic resources.

The computer is in demand so booking is recommended. The Library catalogue shows if a text is held at Homersham Place.

A list of books purchased by the Library in November is now available. The list provides a link for each title to the corresponding NZLS catalogue record, showing where the book is held.

NZLS Auckland Library Branch Legal Researchers Bronwyn McGee and Georgie Deverell will be providing group training on online resources including Brookers, LexisNexis and CCH.

Training will be at the NZLS Waikato Bay of Plenty Branch, Ground Floor, 109 Anglesea Street, Hamilton 3204 in the Meeting Room.

Training sessions will take place on Wednesday 26th October at:

11am – 12.15
12.30 – 2pm

Please RSVP to Georgie Deverell by Friday 21st October indicating the session you will be attending.

If you are unable to attend at these times or would like further individual training please email Georgie.

A list of books purchased by the Library in September is now available. The list provides a link for each title to the corresponding NZLS catalogue record, showing where the book is held.

This is one of the more academic databases we provide; although with more than 450 full text journals it is certainly good value. Economical and economics. A search for example on government regulation produced over 1,000 academic articles, 11 magazine articles, 1300 news items and even three radio/podcast items that you could listen to. A look at what’s new shows articles on gas transport, Russian gas exports, the country image discourse model (Rugby World Cup 2011 anyone?), green marketing, energy distribution and economic growth, and gentrification. If any of these interest you, then I have a database for you!

Go to my.lawsociety, logon, go to the library pages, resources, EPIC, then Gale for this database.

AustLII has recently released the AustLII iPhone app. It is available as a free download from the app store. Due to incredible demand AustLII's developers are working on applications for other devices including the iPad to be realeased soon, as well as Android and Blackberry apps.

The following new databases have been added to NZLII over the last few months:

• New Zealand Law Commission Reports
• Immigration and Protection Tribunal Decisions
• Immigration Advisers Complaints and Disciplinary Tribunal
• Removal Review Authority
• Residence Review Board
• Refugee Status Appeals Authority
• Treaties in Force
• Youth Court
• Coroners Court

The recently established Australian Health Practitioner Regulations Agency (AHPRA) implements the new National Registration and Accreditation Scheme across Australia. AHPRA supports the National Health Practitioner Boards that regulate chiropractors, dentists, nurses, midwifes, optometrists, osteopaths, pharmacists, physiotherapists, podiatrists and psychologists. The decisions of these health boards in all states and territories in Australia are available in the new Australian health practitioner law library on AustLII.

Not a military officer, but a very helpful broad database of articles and books. This is for when you want a change from Google. It has nearly 100,000,000 article and book references including lots of full text material. Subjects cover everything from time management (vital for lawyers) to computer and operations research (I couldn’t even understand the titles here) to healthcare reforms and articles from the Financial Law Reporter (full text too). Definitely worth using as long as you don’t get too distracted.

Click here for this database or go to my.lawsociety, logon, go to the library pages, resources, EPIC, then Gale.

A list of books purchased in August, by the Library, is now available. The list provides a link for each title to the corresponding  NZLS catalogue record which shows  the locations where the book  is held.

One of the Epic databases available to you in the libraries and though your my.lawsociety pages is Legaltrac.

This database indexes a large number of legal journals from around the world and includes some New Zealand journals. It indexes law reviews, bar association journals and legal newspapers. Some of these are available in full text as well or even as spoken files that you can either download or listen to. The indexing starts in 1980 and has more than 1.6 million items indexed!

On the database front page you will see a simple search box with buttons underneath that allow you to limit the words you enter to subject headings only, keywords or the entire document (the default option). There are also three tick boxes that give you some preset limits. Underneath those the database highlights new articles on selected topics for your interest.

Searching. Use the box on the front page for most searching. I would recommend limiting searches to keywords first off to see how many results you get. Results come back to you with the most recent first. They are organised by article type – academic, magazines, books, news and multimedia. It is always worth looking at all categories. The orange bar at the top of the page also gives you other search options including browsing by subject, browsing by publication and advanced search which gives you many possible search options to try.

Results. Ticking the box to the right of the item saves it to a result list. After you have looked at all the results and selected ones you are interested in, you can go to this list by clicking “marked items” in the orange bar at the top of the page. You then tick which ones you want to keep and those results can be printed, downloaded or emailed to you.

Training sessions

There will be training sessions for the new branch library computers on Wednesday 14 September and Tuesday 20 September in the Wellington High Court library at 5.30 pm. To book for one of the two training sessions please go to http://bookwhen.com/nzlslibrary

The NZLS Library books and journals are on an internet catalogue that is free and easily accessible from our website. Go to http://www.lawsocietylibrary.org.nz/catalogue/ to look at it. This catalogue is much more comprehensive that the previous LINX catalogue.

The catalogue contains not only records of all the texts in the Auckland, Canterbury and Wellington libraries, but also all of the journals and law report series. We are adding more to it too as we check to make sure that all of the older materials in the libraries, including encyclopedias and 19th century books are added. The books from Otago and Whangarei libraries are also being added to the catalogue. Finally we have catalogued all the electronic resources we have in the main and branch libraries.

If you are looking for recent issues of a journal or law report, you can use the catalogue to check and see which library has received which issue and when. You should bookmark the catalogue so that you can check to see if we have what you are interested in before you leave your office or email us.

Training sessions

There will be training sessions for the new branch library computers on Wednesday 14 September and Tuesday 20 September in the Wellington High Court library at 5.30 pm. To book for one of the two training sessions please go to http://bookwhen.com/nzlslibrary

The Library has updated the computers in the Wellington branch libraries. They are now the same models as are used in the other branch libraries around the country. These computers also access exactly the same information in the same way. This means some changes for practitioners used to the former WDLS system.

Robin Anderson will be holding training sessions in the Wellington High Court library to demonstrate the differences to practitioners. Book for one of the two training sessions scheduled. 

He will also be visiting Masterton soon for training there. Practitioners from Masterton and surrounding areas who are interested should email Robin to register interest.

The Nursing and Allied Health Collection database indexes over 1,000 journals and has over 6 million article references.

This is a huge depth of information covering everything from healthcare reform, administration, nursing practices and patient care.

It is a good way of finding articles on topics from best practice to current treatment options for a particular medical problem. It is definitely going to be useful for some lawyers in their day-to-day practice.

There are several New Zealand and Australian titles included in the coverage, too. It is accessible on my.lawsociety go to resources, EPIC, then Gale for this database.

The Gale World History in Context is more of a portal or gateway than a database.

It is a very good way to discover a topic and then drill down into it.

It includes images, primary source materials, extracts from books and encyclopedias, magazines, academic journals, newspapers and even audio. Law related uses may be limited, but it is a very good distraction for anyone interested in history.

Go to my.lawsociety library page, resources, EPIC, then Gale for this database. It is at the bottom of the list of databases.

The Ministry of Justice now has a section on its website which provides information and resources to assist you to provide legal aid services. It includes forms, proceedings steps, rates and fees, and manuals. You will also find guidelines and criteria for approval as a legal aid provider, and details on the new quality framework - the quality assurance structure for legal aid providers.

This EPIC Gale database has over 4 million references to articles and news, including many with the full text attached. It will be a useful database for those working in the CHYPF, Family law, Mental Health and Criminal law areas. In addition you may find useful insights to your own and your colleagues’ quirks. The database covers everything from OCD to adolescent psychology to behavourial brain research to the role of grandparents in helping children’s behavioural problems. Definitely something for everyone here.

Logon to my.lawsociety from here, then select the Gale link for this database.

In-house lawyers may not be aware of the full range of resources and services offered by the NZLS library. The libraries offer invaluable tools that make it easier to stay on top of legal and corporate developments.

Situated in Auckland, Wellington, Dunedin, and Christchurch the libraries also offer a nationwide delivery service. Wellington based law librarian Robin Anderson says their collection goes wider than just legal information and includes extensive resources through the EPIC collection of databases. This includes reference resources in the Gale database in areas including business economics and theory, general business and access to the respected LegalTrac database of 1400 legal publications. Another of the EPIC databases is Academic OneFile which provides extensive coverage of the physical sciences, technology, medicine, social sciences, the arts, theology and literature with millions of articles available in both PDF and HTML full-text with no restrictions. It is updated daily and even includes full-text coverage of the New York Times back to 1995.

This is a database of information on companies, markets and industries and has a wide range of sources including business and trade journals, newspapers and news agencies and company profiles from 1980 onwards.

A search for “corporate counsel” in the title, keyword or abstract fields found over 1,000 hits including references to the Wall St Journal, New York Times, CorporateCounsel, InsideCounsel and Professional Services Close-up. Many of the articles were available in full-text too. A search for “New Zealand” and (legal or law) found many references too including articles on Copyright law changes, the US Dept of Justice dropping antitrust investigations of Air New Zealand and the arrival of HMNZS Te Mana for a 5 day visit to Ho Chi Minh City on 27 June 2011. Plenty there to interest/distract a New Zealand law practitioner.

Go to my.lawsociety, logon, go to the library pages, resources, EPIC, then Gale for this.

This major database indexes more than 11,000 journals and includes more than 3,500 journals available in full text.

The focus of the database is on the Humanities, Medicine, Science and Technology. In addition it also has podcasts and even videos and it also covers foreign language However it does index law journals and the full text of the ABA Law Journal is there. I even found a 2011 podcast called “A new frontier in space travel: the law” from American National Public Radio that you can listen to. A search on wine law found 11 items and family law and Hague, full text results only, found 33 items. So a nice variety of information just waiting for you.

Go to my.lawsociety, logon, go to the library pages, resources, EPIC, then Gale for this database. 

The Appendices to the Journals of the House of Representatives (AtoJs or AJHRs) are a collection of government related reports including reports documenting the work of government departments and public organisations as well as reports of select committees and commissions of inquiry. The AtoJs have been published every year since 1858, and are important official records of New Zealand’s social, economic and political history. The National Library of New Zealand is managing a collaborative programme to digitise the AtoJs and make them easy to access and freely available online.

With the recent digitisation of more volumes, the coverage of the AtoJs online now extends from 1861 to 1906. The recently added volumes contain reports on coal mining, Parihaka, the Tarawera eruption, the Sweating Commission and the Boer War, to name just a few. A great deal of information about the people of that time is included in lists of civil servants, sheep owners, land purchasers, Māori landowners, petitioners, etc, as the activities of government intersected with people’s everyday lives.

The complete digitisation of the AtoJs is a long-term project, requiring contributions from many stakeholders.

This database provides access to selected content from over 500 industry journals and news sources covering both historic and current issues relating to the cultural, leisure and economic aspects of tourism. The collection also has information from travel handbooks so that you can research travel possibilities to help with that life/work balance.

I tried “ash cloud” as a search term since that is certainly something that concerns air travellers at the moment. The most recent items were from industry journals dated 29 June, which is less than a week ago, so the database is certainly up to date. In addition to the the tourism aspects of transport, the database also has a wide coverage of the more industrial aspects of transport issues.

You can find it in the library section of my.lawsociety under EPIC databases, then Gale database.

The New Zealand Legislation website is undergoing redevelopment. The Parliamentary Counsel Office has made a preview version of the website public to show what’s changing, and to gather responses from users.

The preview website provides legislation through a new interface that will evolve as development work progresses, to introduce more new and simplified features. Work is expected to take around 12–18 months to complete. The PCO's goal is to provide a website that makes legislation even more accessible
 
This staged approach makes it possible to test and implement developments without affecting the stability and reliability of the New Zealand Legislation website. That site will continue to operate unchanged. And it allows the pubic to try the preview site’s new features and to tell the PCO what they think.
 
Warning:the preview website is work in progress. While it is intended to provide the same up-to-date legislation as the New Zealand Legislation website, you should not rely on it. Instead, refer to the New Zealand Legislation website

This is a database from Ebsco that you can access in the 3 main law libraries and from your my.lawsociety page, going to Library, Epic and then Ebsco. It includes quite a few full text journals as well as index references to even more materials. May of the full text articles are in pdf form and appear just as if you were reading them in the journal concerned.

A search on the phrase “family dispute resolution” brings 10 articles. Take away the speech marks and you get 16 references from journals such as Family Matters (all in full text), Texas Monthly, Long Island Business News and Human Rights. A search on multi disciplinary practices brings 28 references including full text articles from Case Western Reserve Law Review reporting on a 2002 symposium on the topic.

Mind you I also got 28 results for a search on cat grooming, so calling it broadly based is an understatement. Please do go and use the database. There is a wealth of useful information just waiting for you to access it.

Power to the Auckland High Court building and the NZLS library will be shutdown on Saturday 9th July from 10am to 4pm. The building will be closed and people will not be able to access/stay in the building during this time.
 
All entrances to the building will be patrolled and secured by security guards. They have been advised not to let people into the building.
 

The Canterbury Library team is still operating from post-earthquake temporary premises at 8 Homersham Place, Burnside.

A collection of core texts and loose-leaf services has been retrieved from the NZLS Library in the Courts building and is now available at Homersham Place (reference only).

To see if an item is held at Homersham Place, check the online catalogue.

Contact us if what you require is showing as held in the Court building.  We can access the collection to retrieve items however we will need one or two days notice.

A computer is available for practitioners to search the electronic collection at Homersham Place. The computer is in demand so it’s advisable to book a time with us to use it.

Library document delivery and research services are available as usual.

More news

This is a very large database of over 9.5 million references. It covers all health issues including illnesses, chronic illnesses, healthcare reforms, fitness, professional standards and evaluation. It is important to note that these are covered from the health professional and academic perspective rather than a consumer perspective. It is nonetheless a very useful source of information for any work you have which touches on these areas.

In addition the Gale databases at my.lawsociety.org.nz also have two more databases that cover parts of this area – Nursing and Allied Health Collection and a more public oriented Health and Wellness Resource Center & Alternative Health Module.

All of them are worth a look.

The Parliamentary Counsel Office is keen to find out from key users of legislation what legislation they would like the Office to reprint in hard copy in 2011/12.  
A major consideration is the availability of the New Zealand legislation website, which provides users with up-to-date compiled legislation that they are in the process of checking. Hard copy reprints are often out of date very soon after publication, so they expect the demand for them to decrease. 
To start the survey, please click on the following link, or paste it into your browser: 
http://surveymonkey.com/s/pco-reprints-survey
Please complete the survey by Friday 15 July 2011.

This is a broad general current events and general interest database that brings together sources of current information.

It is not a current affairs database, so the Chilean ash cloud is not mentioned much at the moment, but a search on family law issues brings up interesting articles on employment protection for victims of domestic violence, domestic partnership headaches, sex addiction issues, podcasting in court and a father’s obligation to provide a college education for his daughters.

There were also full text articles on different types of dispute resolution in family law, family law in the classroom and collaborative law. All this from just the first few pages of a simple search. Definitely a database to explore.

You will find it on the my.lawsociety.org.nz web pages under Library, Epic and then Gale.

I know from the number of you that I see at events here in Wellington that lawyers are definitely interested in the arts and in music.

This database that you can access from my.lawsociety is one that will help you broaden and deepen your knowledge of the arts. While it does not have a New Zealand focus, it has nearly 6 million references to film, music, theatre and more. If you have clients working in the fine arts and music areas then even a simple search on the word contract will pull up useful news and information. Some titles are available in full text – including Publishers Weekly. Useful for getting the overseas view on a topic.

To access the database, log in to your my.lawsociety account, go to the Library section, Epic databases and click on Gale. It is quite a way down the page of databases though. 

This database of over three and a half million references covers a broad and slightly surprising combination of fields.

Advertising, public relations, mass media, the internet and social networks are there, but so are journalism and linguistics. Communications in all its many and varied forms. Given that communication is part of the lawyer’s toolkit, the database should have information and news of interest.

A search for lawyer as a keyword produced articles including one from the “International journal for the semiotics of law”. Not a title the NZLS Library holds for some reason. However there were articles on bias, standing, mock jury trials as well as police misconduct and privacy. Plenty in fact for a New Zealand lawyer to be interested in.

To access the database, log in to your my.lawsociety account, go to the Library section, Epic databases and click on Gale.

NZLII has announced that the 1908 consolidated statutes are now available on www.nzlii.org The data is provided by Auckland University in partnership with the PCO (Parliamentary Counsel Office). With the provision of these statutes, all New Zealand statutes from 1841 are now available free of charge online. Other historical Acts can be found in the New Zealand Acts as Enacted (1841-2007) database and current legislation is available in the New Zealand Acts database or on the New Zealand legislation website.

An extensive collection of LexisNexis online resources is now available in the Law Society Library and branch libraries. A 45 minute webinar will be held specifically for NZLS members to present to you the range of sources available and the various methods of searching and browsing this critical legal content.

Date 3rd May at 2.30

Take part in this training from the convenience of your own desk. All you need is access to the Internet, and a telephone. Instructions on what to expect will be sent when you register.

 What is a webinar?

A webinar is simply short for a web based seminar and can encompass online presentations, a meeting or training. The key benefit is that training can be delivered over the web whatever your location and without you needing to travel. The training is in a public environment with other Law Society members and a trainer from LexisNexis. By clicking on a link within an email and entering your name you will be able to view the trainer’s screen and follow the presentation whilst listening to the audio via your telephone.

How to join

To attend the Webinar simply email training@lexisnexis.co.nz with the subject heading ‘NZLS LexisNexis Webinar’. You will receive a confirmation email with details of how to sign in prior to the start of the session.

Library staff in Christchurch have relocated to a temporary site at 8 Homersham Place, Burnside (off Roydvale Avenue).  There is still no word on how long it will be before we can return to the library in the Courts building in Durham Street.

A computer is available at Level 1, 8 Homersham Place for practitioners to search the Library’s electronic collection. This is a comprehensive collection of LexisNexis, Thomson Reuters and CCH databases offering case law and commentary on all areas of New Zealand law as well as Australian, Canadian and United Kingdom material.

As well as several replacement loose-leaf services provided by legal publishers, we have been able to retrieve a number of loose-leaf volumes as well as several boxes of books from our collection in the Courts building. To check if a title is available search the Library’s online catalogue. If available, the shelf location will display as "Homersham Place".  If you require material which is still inaccessible, let us know and we should be able to source it for you. We are also purchasing any new editions published. Document delivery and research services are available as usual.

Auckland, Wellington and Canterbury libraries will be closed on Friday 22 April for Easter. The Auckland library will reopen on Tuesday 26 April and Wellington and Canterbury libraries will reopen on Wednesday 27 April.

The Supreme Court, sitting as a panel of seven judges, has abolished a 400-year-old law that grants expert witnesses testifying in court immunity from charges of breach of duty in contract or negligence. The full article is here, and further comment on the UK Supreme Court blog can be found here.

The NZLS Library in Christchurch remains closed after the 22 February earthquake. No access is possible to the Courts building in which the Library is located. The building is currently cordoned within the 'red zone'. The Courts building and NZLS Library collection have suffered damage and no information is yet available on how long it will be before the location will be operational, however this is expected to take some time. 

NZLS staff based in Christchurch will relocate to a new building in the north west part of the city, in early April. Staff are working remotely in the meantime. Several computers will be made available in the new location for practitioners to access the NZLS collection of electronic legal resources.

Once working from the new location, Library staff will be relying on the NZLS electronic collection, and where possible inter-loaning texts from other libraries or purchasing newly published editions of key texts until it is possible to return to the Library in the Courts building.

Some Christchurch matters have been transferred to Courts in Ashburton and Timaru.  The NZLS electronic collection is available from computers in Solicitors’ rooms at both these locations.

Canterbury Library staff can be contracted by email at canterbury@nzlslibrary.org.nz. Phone enquiries can be made to the Wellington (04) 473 6202 or Auckland libraries (09) 304 1020.

The British and Irish Legal Information Institute, BAILII, now offers RSS feeds for a variety of courts and other materials. There are two types of feeds, those announcing recent additions and those announcing recent decisions. Recent additions are items that have recently been added to the database, though they may be of some antiquity and recent decisions are items that have only lately been published.

EPIC, a vast collection of electronic journal indexes and full text databases is now accessible from your desktop via the my.lawsociety site.

You will find it on the Library pages under Resources.  A wide range of journal databases is offered. Of particular interest is Legaltrac which indexes 1,400+ legal journal titles, including New Zealand titles.  LegalTrac also contains law-related articles from over 1,000 additional business and general interest titles.

Nicola Stedman who has been dealing with the judgments in the library for the past 2 years is leaving on Friday 4 February to return to her home town of Dunedin. She will be studying finance, part time at University and having trained as a lawyer she is keen to get some work experience in a law firm. 

Glenn McLay is moving into Nicola’s role and takes on the responsibility of managing all the processes associated with judgments, and their records and PDF’s, on LINX database.

Tisha Patel is our new Library Assistant. She previously worked at the University of Auckland Library and is currently studying for her postgraduate Diploma in Information Studies.

NZLS Branch library computers in the Auckland region will soon be upgraded to a new online system with new computer equipment to be rolled out during February 2011.

Changes are designed to improve network access and resolve current printing issues. As part of the upgrade, the LINX Folio version will be replaced by the online version of the LINX database, Linxplus.

Kirsten who has worked at the NZLS Library in Dunedin since March 2008 is off to Melbourne. Her new position is that of Electronic Resources Librarian at Monash University, Melbourne, where she will be looking after “all aspects of their electronic resources from 'hmmm shall we buy that', to 'oh no it's fallen over'”. She held a similar role at Victoria University for several years before working at the ODLS/NZLS and “enjoys the evolving and technologically dynamic nature of the work”. Her last day at the Otago library is 14 January. We wish her all the very best in her new role.

The New Zealand Legislation website now offers web feeds to keep users up to date with changes to the law. You can subscribe to ready-made feeds such as All new Acts published in the last 30 days, or design custom feeds that match your particular interests.  The Legislation website has a very useful page with information about web feeds, links to subscribe to ready-made feeds, and a step by step guide to creating custom feeds.

The Ministry of Justice has developed a Human Rights section for its website, which is now online. It  brings together a large amount of information on and various documents produced about New Zealand’s international human rights obligations as well as domestic human rights legislation. On the website, you can now find – for example – periodic government reports, lists of issues (written questions) and concluding observations of treaty committees with respect to all the international human rights instruments ratified by New Zealand.

The existing Bill of Rights section of the MoJ website has been incorporated into the new Human Rights section and has been expanded with a separate overview of all reports tabled by the Attorney-General in the House of Representatives under section 7 of the Bill of Rights Act. This section of the MOJ website is still a work in progress and more information and documents may be added at a later stage.

The Wellington and Canterbury libraries will close at 5pm Thursday 23rd December 2010 and re-open Monday 10th January 2011. 

The Auckland library will close at 1pm Friday 24th December 2010 and re-open Wednesday 5th January 2011. 

If you require access to any of the main libraries during the break, and do not have an after hours card, please contact your library.

The Legal Information Institute of India is now open for public access, prior to its formal launch in India in early 2011.

LII of India at present has 50 databases, including over 300,000 decisions from 37 Courts and Tribunals, Indian national legislation from 1836, over 800 bilateral treaties, law reform reports and about 500 law journal articles. The LawCite citator tracks case and journal article citations. Further case law, and State and Territory legislation, will be added by the time of the formal launch.

LII of India has been developed through cooperation between four leading Indian Law Schools (NALSAR University of Law, Hyderabad; National Law School of India University, Bangalore;  National Law University, Delhi, and  Rajiv Gandhi School of Intellectual Property Law, Indian Institute of Technology - Kharagpur) with initial development and technical support from AustLII. The hub of the project will be NALSAR in Hyderabad, and Prof VC Vivekanandan of NALSAR is the Director. Funding support has been provided primarily by AusAid, with additional support from the Australian Research Council and the Commonwealth Secretariat.

Lord Hope of Craighead ponders the necessity of the United Kingdom's Supreme Court in an inaugural lecture at the Newcastle Law School.
"We live on the verge of an era of austerity...Some courts may have to be closed, there may have to be some reduction in the support services and there will, inevitably, be a reduction in the numbers of people who are employed to provide them...If the institution cannot make further cuts without damage to its ability to function, what about the institution itself?   Do we really need a UK Supreme Court at all?...it costs money and takes time for an appeal to come to us, and almost always the case will already have been considered by the Court of Appeal.  Does subjecting it to a further level of appeal really add value to the process?"

The local LexisNexis trainer will be presenting an introduction to the large number of LexisNexis online services now available in the Law Society Library and branch libraries.

Format - A 50 minute presentation and demonstration of the databases followed by wine and cheese and a chance to ask questions.
Thursday 25 November, 4.30 to 6.30 pm at the Law Library.

RSVP to Robin Anderson for catering purposes (robin.anderson@lawsociety.org.nz)

Friday 15th October 2010, 4.30pm - 6.30pm
NZLS Library, Canterbury

A LexisNexis "tips & tricks' training session is to be held at the NZLS Library, Canterbury, 1st floor, Law Courts Building, 282 Durham Street, Christchurch. This is a chance to find out how to get the best research results from the LexisNexis suite of databases now available on Library conputers. Learn more about the New Zealand Law Society Library's recently extended LexisNexis online collection. Wine & cheese will be served. RSVP to julia.defriez@lawsociety.org.nz by 13 October 2010.

AustLII has now integrated its LawCite international citator into the search result displays of AustLII, NZLII, CommonLII and WorldLII. This means that each case, journal article, law reform report and treaty that appears in a list of search results also includes a link to its citation record in LawCite (click in the small LawCite icon), and stars (1-5) indicating how frequently it is cited. Hovering over the stars indicates the exact number of citations. There is also now a "Display by Citation Frequency" tab, which allows a set of search results to be sorted according to the citation frequency of items in the list. The AustLII User Guides are now being updated to reflect these changes.

The Lawyers and Conveyancers Disciplinary Tribunal's purpose is to hear and determine disciplinary charges against members of the legal and conveyancing professions. The tribunal’s decisions are now online on the Ministry of Justices website. At present there are a selection of 2010 decisions.

The Immigration Advisors Authority has a new page where you can find District Court decisions regarding the Immigration Advisers Authority. To date, the District Court has made three decisions regarding applicants who have appealed the Registrar’s decision to refuse to grant them a licence.

A new database which contains the New Zealand Acts 1841-2007 has been added to NZLII. It has been provided by the Parliamentary Counsel Office and is a database of New Zealand Acts from 1841 to 2007 as originally enacted. The Acts, which are in PDF format, do not include any later amendments or show whether they have been repealed. For current legislation and enacted legislation and repealed legislation since 2007, visit the New Zealand Legislation website.

The NZ Citizens Advice Bureau has celebrated their 40th anniversary and at the same time has launched a new website. For the first time, all the information which each CAB has previously maintained on a standalone basis is now combined into one online resource and made available directly to customers. This includes a database of approximately 40,000 service providers, community organisations, clubs and societies, as well as access to legal information across a wide range of subject areas.

Justice Sir Kenneth Keith, ONZ, KBE, QC, of the International Court of Justice has launched the International Law Library. 

The Library includes 76 databases with nearly 100,000 searchable documents; including databases of decisions of 35 international Courts and Tribunals; 27 databases of Treaties; UN resolutions; and thousands of law journal articles on international law. It is still expanding rapidly. 

A two page brochure outlining the Library is here.

The Library is being developed under an Australian Research Council infrastructure (LIEF) grant.

The Parliamentary Counsel Office (PCO) reprinting policy provides that a reprinting programme will be established each year, in consultation with key users of legislation.

The 2010 reprints survey closed on Friday 30 July 2009 and 48 responses were received, the majority of which were completed on behalf of an organisation or agency, and were submitted by solicitors and librarians. The 2010-2011 reprints programme has now been established, based on results of the annual reprints survey and in accordance with the PCO's reprinting policy.

Find more information here.

AtoJs Online contains a collection of digitised volumes of the Appendices to the Journals of the House of Representatives (A to Js) published by Parliament. The collection currently covers the years 1862 to 1879.

The A to Js of the 1860s and 1870s cover a crucial period in our history – the land wars and the confiscation of land, the discovery of gold and influx of a great many migrants, Vogel’s public works and immigration programme involving a mass government-assisted immigration scheme and the building of railways and roads, and the abolition of the provinces and strengthening of central government.

A total of 600 volumes will eventually be digitised, with progress dependent on funding availability.

LexisNexis have released a new title “Limited Partnerships” as part of their publication Laws of New Zealand. The new title is written by Nick Wells (BCom, LLB (Cantab); BCA(Hons) (Victoria); MBA(Hons) (IMD, Lausanne)), Partner and Phillippa Wilkie (BA, LLB (Auck)), Senior Solicitor, of Chapman Tripp. The Laws of New Zealand is available on the NZLS library computers around the country.

Conflictz is a new database established at the Auckland Law School. It lists publications dealing with New Zealand conflict of laws/private international law in the areas of jurisdiction, choice of law, and recognition and enforcement of judgments in international cross-border litigation. The database is a comprehensive, systematic and up-to-date repository for lawyers, academics and students.

 Find more information here.

From 1 July 2010 the cost of the library’s research service will rise from $35 to $40 per 15 minute unit. The urgent research fee, which is additional, will also increase to $40. All other charges will remain the same.

Find a list of library charges here.

• Animal Law in Australasia. Sankoff, Peter & White, Steven (eds). The Federation Press, 2009
• Celebrating Human rights : sixty years of the universal declaration, proceeding of the Wellington conference Alley, Roderic (ed). New Zealand Institute of International Affairs, 2009
• Companion to the Solicitors’ Code of Conduct 2007 2^nd ed.  Camp, Peter. The Law Society, London, 2009
• Constructive and resulting trusts. Mitchell, Charles (ed.) Hart Publishing, 2010
• Contract as assumption.  Coote, Brian.  Hart Publishing, 2010
• Fiduciary loyalty : protecting the due performance of non-fiduciary.  Conaglen, Matthew. Hart Publishing, 2010
• Goode on commercial law 4^th ed. McKendrick, Ewan (ed).  Penguin, 2010
• Intellectual property and media law companion 4^th ed.  Baden-Powell, Ed et al.  Bloomsbury Professional, 2010
• Judicial review : a New Zealand perspective 2^nd ed. Taylor, GDS. LexisNexis, 2010
• Privacy in schools : a guide to the Privacy Act for principles, teachers and boards of trustees. Dalziel, Kathryn. Office of the Privacy Commissioner, 2009
• Res judicata (Spencer Bower) 4^th ed. Handley, KR.  LexisNexis, 2009
• The law affecting valuation of land in Australia, 4th ed. Hyam, Alan.  Federation Press, 2009
• The solicitors’ handbook 2009 Hopper, Andrew and Treverton-Jones, Gregory.  The Law Society, London, 2009
• With respect : parliamentarians, officials, and judges too. Prebble, Mark. Institute of policy studies, 2010

AustLII is in the process of creating new and updated subject specific libraries, bringing together in one place the relevant legislation, cases and other legal materials and websites relating to specific legal topics, such as privacy, indigenous law, workplace relations law and tax.

• Bayley, Geoff and Kennedy-Grant, Tomas. A guide to the Construction Contracts Act. 2nd ed. Rawlinsons Media Ltd, 2009
• Dyzenhaus et al. A simple common lawyer: essays in honour of Michael Taggart. Hart Publishing, 2009
• Dal Pont GE. Lawyers’ professional responsibility 4th ed. Thomson Reuters, 2009.
• Finn Jeremy. Educating for the profession: Law at Canterbury 1873-1973. Canterbury University Press, 2010
• Fuller et al. Mortgages Companion A Practical Guide to the Law of Mortgages. LexisNexis, 2009
• Keenan, Rebecca (ed) Health care and the law 4th ed. Thomson Reuters, 2010
• McLay, Geoff et al. New Zealand Law Style Guide. Thomson Reuters, 2009
• Penk, Steven & Tobin, Rosemary (eds) Privacy law in New Zealand. Thomson Reuters, 2010
• Phipson on evidence 17th ed. General editor: Hodge M Malek. Sweet & Maxwell, 2009
• Spry ICF. The principles of equitable remedies: specific performances, injunctions, rectification and equitable damages 8th ed. Thomson Reuters, 2009.
• Tennent, Doug. Immigration and refugee law. LexisNexis, 2010
• Watts Peter. Directors Powers & Duties. LexisNexis, 2009

A group of academics, editors and publishers led by Geoff McLay and Justice Chambers have developed a uniform New Zealand legal style guide. The New Zealand Law Style Guide seeks to remedy inconsistent use of styles and provide a unified framework that the courts, law schools, legal practitioners and legal publishers can follow. The guide will be available free on the Law Foundation website in late December 2009 at www.lawfoundation.org.nz but is available to buy in hard copy from Thomson Reuters.

For more information see LawTalk 742.

Brookers and CCH online databases will be available in most NZLS branches by mid 2010. Some locations will take longer, to coincide with new courthouse development or to enable the provision of computer facilities. For more information see LawTalk 742.

Members can now search the online catalogue for texts, law reports and journals held by the main Law Society libraries. Holdings for the Otago Library are currently being added. For help with searching the catalogue contact a NZLS librarian in Auckland, Wellington or Christchurch.

If you require a copy of a document or further research, you can make a document delivery or research request by contacting your nearest Library.