July 2023 Newsletter: News from the BCLI!
July 20, 2023
BY Taja De Silva
A word from our Executive Director
Consultations on our AI and civil liability project are underway
We have now released our Consultation Paper on Artificial Intelligence and Civil Liability. This publication marks the start of the consultation phase of our Artificial Intelligence and Civil Liability Project. We are grateful for the work of our expert project committee on this project so far.
The goal of the AI and Civil Liability Project is to determine how the rules of tort law need to adapt to respond to harm to persons and property caused by autonomous artificial intelligence systems. The project sets out to answer: Who is, or should be, liable for choices made by intelligent machines operating autonomously? What happens when a robot commits a tort?
Check out the Vancouver Sun opinion editorial published along with project committee member, Kristen Thomasen. This article is about our new consultation paper, which proposes draft recommendations to modernize tort law to deal with the challenges of AI. We are inviting comments on draft recommendations before October 1st, 2023, to <[email protected]>.
Our Strategic Plan
BCLI has just posted its Strategic Plan that will guide our work through to 2026. We look forward to implementing this plan, which distills our vision and values into five strategic priorities:
- To lead collaboratively in current and emerging law reform issues;
- To ensure law reform recommendations support consistency with the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP);
- To advance the development of elder law reform;
- To increase flexible, sustainable funding; and
- To be an employer of choice for innovative law reform thinkers.
Karen Campbell Executive Director, BCLI
@kcvancouver
[email protected]
OCTOBER 17 2023
Save the Date! Legal Research 2023: Can the Chatbot Write my Factum?
BCLI is pleased to be co-chairing this year’s full day CLEBC conference on legal research. Julia Lawn, BCLI board member and senior research lawyer with Nathanson, Schachter & Thompson LLP, and Megan Vis-Dunbar, BCLI staff lawyer, will co-chair this professional development seminar on October 17, 2023. Join lawyers, jurists, academics and law librarians as they discuss how AI and other emerging technologies impact various aspects of legal research. Learn some of the pitfalls to watch for and discover ways to use technology creatively to tackle some of the most challenging research problems. We hope you will join us in-person or online for what is sure to be an engaging discussion on the future of legal research.
For a full course agenda and to register, visit the CLEBC course page.
BCLI staff and board were in attendance at both the recent Vancouver Bench and Bar and the Kamloops Bench and Bar Dinners. In Vancouver, our Executive Director Karen Campbell was joined by board members Tejas Madhur and Marian Brown to recognize BCLI board member Ed Wilson, who received the CBABC’s Georges A Goyer, QC Memorial Award for Distinguished Service. Congratulations Ed!
We were also pleased to be at the Kamloops Bench and Bar Dinner. Kelly Melnyk, our new CCEL Director, is also president of the Kamloops Bar Association. Karen travelled to Kamloops to attend the dinner along with staff lawyer Alison Wilkinson and board member Ryan Gauthier. This event was also an opportunity to meet with Thompson Rivers University Dean of Law Daleen Millard. We are building a stronger relationship with TRU Faculty of Law, where BCLI will now have an office for our two Kamloops based lawyers. We look forward to engaging the TRU law community in our work, and to participating in activities in and around the law school!
The Vancouver Sun published an article that features our project partner, Amina Yasin, on our Renovate the Pubic Hearings protect. Amina states that the public hearings process “doesn’t seem to be working for everybody in the way that it’s been idealized”. Our project will respond to this issue with recommendations for specific reforms to the public hearing process. We are grateful to be working with SFU Wosk Centre for Dialogue on this project.
