Law

News
The Supreme Court of Canada has sent a strong message to judges, warning them that journalists should be ordered to identify confidential sources only in rare circumstances -- especially the sources behind important public-interest stories. In an Oct. 22 ruling, the court overturned an order compelling Globe and Mail reporter Daniel Leblanc to answer questions, as part of a civil action, that could identify a key source consulted for his investigation of the Quebec sponsorship scandal.

As it did earlier this year in a similar case involving the National Post, the court refused to give journalists a blanket right to protect sources. But it stressed "the high societal interest in investigative journalism" and said journalists should be forced to name sources only when the information is "vital to the integrity of the administration of justice." The court also overturned a publication ban that prevented the Globe from reporting on the federal government's civil action to recover money paid to a Quebec aid firm.

The Quebec courts have been directed to reconsider what Leblanc should be asked to reveal, after weighing the importance of his evidence to the civil case against the public interest in protecting sources of news stories on important public issues.

Read the Globe ruling and the earlier National Post ruling.

Read the Globe and Toronto Star reports on the ruling.

Commentary
Don't let the negative headlines get you down – there’s good news for journalists in the the Supreme Court of Canada’s May 7 ruling in the case of the National Post, its former reporter Andrew McIntosh, and the possibly forged document at the heart of a nine-year legal battle to protect a source. Law section editor Dean Jobb reviews the ruling and what it means for journalists:

The Canadian Human Rights Commission has a 100 percent conviction rate for hate speech cases, and rights commissions routinely make bizarre decisions upholding, for instance, the right of fast-food workers not to wash their hands. Right? Wrong. These false claims and more have been carelessly spread by Canadian news media, writes Richard Moon, Professor of Law at the University of Windsor. Too often, he argues, journalists treat alleged facts as if they were opinions, channeling them to the audience in the name of "balance" without context or verification.

Commentary
Do journalists have the right to protect a confidential source? Can a news outlet be sued for libel if it made every effort to get the story right? Does publicizing a crime make it impossible for the suspect to have a fair trial? These issues are on the Supreme Court of Canada's docket this fall in six cases that will reshape media law in Canada. J-Source law section editor Dean Jobb explores what's at stake in a commentary first published in the Winnipeg Free Press.