Canadian Legal Data

Open Access to Canadian Law

Free, open access to 227,000+ Canadian court decisions and 26,000+ laws and regulations — for researchers, developers, lawyers, and anyone interested in Canadian law.

Coverage

Federal Courts

  • Supreme Court of Canada 1877–present
  • Federal Court of Appeal 2001–present
  • Federal Court 2001–present
  • Tax Court of Canada 2003–present
  • Court Martial Appeal Court 2001–present

Provincial Courts

  • BC Court of Appeal 1999–present
  • BC Supreme Court 2000–present
  • Newfoundland and Labrador Court of Appeal 2009–present
  • Nova Scotia Court of Appeal 1993–present
  • Nova Scotia Supreme Court 2001–present
  • Nova Scotia Provincial Court 2001–present
  • Nova Scotia Family Court 2001–2023
  • Nova Scotia Small Claims Court 2001–present
  • Ontario Court of Appeal 1998–present
  • Yukon Court of Appeal 2000–present

Tribunals

Federal
  • Canada Agricultural Review Tribunal (CART) 2010–present
  • Canada Industrial Relations Board (CIRB) 1995–present
  • Canadian Human Rights Tribunal (CHRT) 2003–present
  • Canadian International Trade Tribunal (CITT) 1980–present
  • Competition Tribunal (CT) 2000–present
  • Federal Public Sector Labour Relations and Employment Board (FPSLREB) 2003–present
  • Information Commissioner of Canada (OIC) 2019–present
  • Occupational Health and Safety Tribunal Canada (OHSTC) 1992–present
  • Public Service Disclosure Protection Tribunal (PSDPT) 2011–present
  • Refugee Appeal Division (RAD) 2013–present
  • Refugee Law Lab Reporter (RLLR) 2019–present
  • Refugee Protection Division (RPD) 2002–2020
  • Social Security Tribunal (SST) 2013–present
  • Specific Claims Tribunal Canada (SCT) 2012–present
  • Transportation Appeal Tribunal of Canada (TATC) 2007–present

Legislation

Federal
  • Statutes 1870–present
  • Regulations 1945–present
Ontario
  • Statutes 1986–present
  • Regulations 1990–present
British Columbia
  • Statutes 1924–present
  • Regulations 1968–present
Alberta
  • Statutes 2002–present
  • Regulations 1969–present
Manitoba
  • Statutes 1985–present
  • Regulations 1972–present
New Brunswick
  • Statutes 1973–present
  • Regulations 1980–present
Newfoundland and Labrador
  • Statutes 1957–present
  • Regulations 1986–present
Northwest Territories
  • Statutes 1988–2024
  • Regulations 1990–present
Nova Scotia
  • Statutes 1900–present
  • Regulations 1913–present
Prince Edward Island
  • Statutes 2003–present
  • Regulations 2002–present
Saskatchewan
  • Statutes 1954–present
  • Regulations 1943–present
Yukon
  • Statutes 2000–present
  • Regulations 1957–present

Four Ways to Access

Model Context Protocol (MCP) lets AI assistants like Claude and ChatGPT query our entire database in plain language. Connect once, then ask anything about Canadian law.

Setup for Claude

May require a paid Claude account.

In claude.ai: click Settings → Connectors → Add Custom Connector → Name: a2aj → MCP Server URL:

https://mcp.a2aj.ca/mcp

Start a new chat and ask anything about Canadian law.

MCP Setup Guide →

Search and retrieve specific documents programmatically. No API key required. Supports full-text and name search with advanced operators (Boolean, phrases, wildcards, proximity), date and dataset filters, and bilingual results.

Key Endpoints

  • /search — Full-text and name search across cases and laws, with filters for date, dataset, and language
  • /fetch — Retrieve a specific document by citation (e.g. 2023 SCC 17 or RSC 1985, c C-46)
  • /coverage — List available datasets with document counts and date ranges

Quick Start

$ pip install requests pandas import requests, pandas as pd # Search case law response = requests.get("https://api.a2aj.ca/search", params={ "query": "right to housing", "doc_type": "cases", "size": 10 }) df = pd.DataFrame(response.json()["results"]) # Fetch a specific case by citation response = requests.get("https://api.a2aj.ca/fetch", params={ "citation": "2023 SCC 17", "doc_type": "cases" })

Response Fields

{ "results": [{ "dataset": "SCC", "citation_en": "2023 SCC 17", "citation2_en": "", "name_en": "Canadian Council for Refugees v. Canada ...", "document_date_en": "2023-06-16T00:00:00", "url_en": "https://decisions.scc-csc.ca/...", "unofficial_text_en": "...", "upstream_license": "See upstream license ..." }, ...] }

See the full field reference for all columns.

Interactive API Docs → Code Examples →

Access bulk case law and legislation through HuggingFace. Ideal for training language models, large-scale empirical analysis, or working with data in Python. Supports streaming for memory-efficient loading.

Quick Start

$ pip install datasets pandas from datasets import load_dataset # Load all case law (or filter by court: data_dir="SCC") cases = load_dataset("a2aj/canadian-case-law", split="train") # Load all laws (or filter: data_dir="LEGISLATION-FED") laws = load_dataset("a2aj/canadian-laws", split="train") df = cases.to_pandas()

Returns the same fields as the API: dataset, citation_en, name_en, document_date_en, unofficial_text_en, and bilingual equivalents. See the full field reference.

Case Law Dataset → Laws Dataset → Code Examples →

Download datasets directly as Parquet files — an efficient columnar storage format that works with pandas, Polars, and most data analysis tools. No API keys or special libraries required beyond pandas.

Quick Start

$ pip install pandas import pandas as pd # Load a specific court (e.g. Supreme Court of Canada) url = "https://huggingface.co/datasets/a2aj/canadian-case-law/resolve/main/SCC/train.parquet" df = pd.read_parquet(url) # Load federal legislation url = "https://huggingface.co/datasets/a2aj/canadian-laws/resolve/main/LEGISLATION-FED/train.parquet" df = pd.read_parquet(url)

Download Instructions & Examples →

Understanding A2AJ Data

1citation_en"2023 SCC 17"
name_en"Canadian Council for Refugees v. Canada (Citizenship and Immigration)"
2url_en"https://decisions.scc-csc.ca/scc-csc/scc-csc/en/item/19957/index.do"
3scraped_timestamp_en"2026-01-23T09:02:15"
4unofficial_text_en"Canadian Council for Refugees v. Canada … (full text)"
5upstream_license"See upstream license, including non-commercial use and other restrictions: https://perma.cc/6Z3Z-UPAC. Note: This is an unofficial reproduction of a Supreme Court of Canada decision, without endorsement or affiliation by the Supreme Court of Canada."

Records hold English and French versions where the publisher produces both, in fields ending _en and _fr.

  1. 1

    Citation

    The document's official name and identifier (eg, style of cause and neutral citation for a judicial decision; statute name and citation for legislation).

  2. 2

    Link to official version

    The source of the unofficial A2AJ raw data.

  3. 3

    Timestamp

    The date A2AJ collected the source document.

  4. 4

    Unofficial text

    Raw text created through automated processing of the source document.

  5. 5

    Licensing rules

    Source publishers of public legal documents set rules around how they may be used, including, for example, whether commercial use is permitted or restricted. A2AJ passes those terms unchanged on to users of the data. Follow the link to read the terms, including who to ask for permissions.

Currency and accuracy

The dataset is updated weekly: legislation on Saturdays and case law on Sundays. The refreshed dataset can be downloaded in its entirety from HuggingFace. No update is needed if you connect via API or MCP.

All texts are unofficial copies collected through automated processes. While we make best efforts, these automated processes inevitably produce some inaccuracies and incompleteness. Always verify critical information against official sources (linked in each document).

Licences and permissions

Courts, tribunals and government jurisdictions impose different terms on the uses of their documents. These terms vary widely, and attach to each document, not the dataset as a whole. For example, some source publishers prohibit commercial use without permission. Others do not impose such restrictions. Researchers interacting with the data with questions about the applicability of terms should contact the source publishers directly.

A2AJ does not administer or interpret the licences attached to documents. A2AJ is not part of, or endorsed by, any court, tribunal or government.

A2AJ's work — our code, and how we collect and organize the data — is under the MIT licence. It is free to use for any purpose, including commercial use.

Privacy

Court decisions are public documents but may contain sensitive personal information. Users must comply with applicable privacy laws and respect publication bans. We encourage responsible use that considers the impact on affected communities. See A2AJ's privacy policy here.

Citation

If you use this dataset in your research or projects, please cite:

Sean Rehaag, Simon Wallace & Clifford McCarten, "A2AJ Canadian Legal Data" (2025), online: GitHub https://github.com/a2aj-ca/canadian-legal-data (updated 2026)