Osgoode has always prided itself on innovative approaches to law and teaching. As host to the Law Commission of Ontario (LCO), Osgoode has a commitment to law reform initiatives everywhere. Better to support these research ideals, the Osgoode Library now subscribes to the Australian Law Reform Commission Library on HeinOnline.

The Australian Law Reform Commission (ALRC) is a federal agency that reviews Australia’s laws to ensure they provide improved access to justice for all Australians by making laws and related processes more equitable, modern, fair and efficient. The ALRC conducts inquiries—also known as references—into areas of law at the request of the Attorney General’s Department. Based on its research and consultations throughout an inquiry, the ALRC makes recommendations to government so that government can make informed decisions about law reform. ALRC recommendations do not automatically become law, however over 85 per cent of ALRC reports have been either substantially or partially implemented—making it one of the most effective and influential agents for legal reform in the common law world. The ALRC’s objective is to make recommendations for law reform that:

• Bring the law into line with current conditions and needs
• Remove defects in the law
• Simplify the law
• Adopt new or more effective methods of administering the law and dispensing justice
• Provide improved access to justice

The Australian Law Reform Commission database in HeinOnline consists of more than 650 titles and 130,000 pages of material related to Civil Procedure, Discrimination, Intellectual Property, National Security, Indigenous Rights, and more. The Commission’s Reports fall into different classifications that include Reports, Working Papers, Discussion Papers, Issue Papers, and Reform.

The ALRC Library on HeinOnline can be searched full-text – or you can browse by Subjects such as:

• Reports
  • Final project reports to the Attorney General in response to specific matters that the attorney general had instructed the Commission to investigate; each report includes the current legal status, areas for improvement, and recommendations for how to improve.
• Community Law Reform Consultative Documents
• Research Papers
• Working Papers
  • Tentative proposals of the Commission; they encourage comments and criticism before the issuing of the final report.
• Discussion Papers
  • Brief summaries of the preliminary findings of the Commission; they are also issued to promote comment and criticism of the Commission’s findings.
• Issue Papers
  • Published in order to demonstrate the issues involved in specific areas as defined by the Attorney General.
• Reform
  • A bulletin of law reform news, views, and information. It is designed to inform readers in an informal way of developments relevant to the reform of the law in Australia
• New South Wales Law Reform Commission Reports
• Sentencing Research Papers
• And more