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Crown Copyright & Licensing

About Copyright

Who owns copyright?

Reproduction of Federal Law Order

As the result of the Order In Council that was passed in January of 1997, there is no requirement to seek permission to reproduce primary legal information of the Government of Canada and there are no applicable fees. The Reproduction of Federal Law Order [http://laws.justice.gc.ca/en/otherreg/SI-97-5/index.html] applies only to Government of Canada legislation, statutes, regulations, court decisions and tribunal decisions and authorizes anyone, unless otherwise specified, to copy federal legislation, statutes, regulations, court decisions and tribunal decisions without the usual restrictions that govern Crown copyright materials, provided that one is careful to ensure the accuracy of the materials reproduced and that the reproduction is not represented as an official version.

The Reproduction of Federal Law Order does not apply to any materials that have been copyrighted privately or separately by a third party, and that happens to have been included with, added to, or referred to in the Government of Canada legislation, statute, regulation and/or decision. An example of this would extend to the reproduction of added-value features such as the captions of headnotes, footnotes, summaries and additional comments which are added to decisions handed down by federally constituted courts and tribunals. These added-value features are not included in the Order and therefore, reproduction is prohibited without having secured written authorization.