Legal Current Awareness Sources (free or low cost)

This is a really significant resource
Current Awareness from the Inner Temple Library provides up-to-date information regarding new case law, changes in legislation, and legal news, which Library Staff think will be of interest to lawyers practising in England and Wales. The content is selected and updated daily by information professionals from the Inner Temple Library in London. There are many entries on just about every day. This is a major current awareness resource, set up as a blog, so you can subscribe with RSS and get alerts every day. You can also receive "normal" email alerts, follow the blog on Twitter, get the Widget or follow on Facebook. (The Inner Temple Library is one of the four Inns of Court Libraries, which serve barristers, judges and bar students in England and Wales.)

Directgov is the overall public-facing Governnment site. The Newsroom section (see top list of options on the home page) provides a selection of citizen-friendly press release and information in various forms.

The Central Office of Information (COI) provides all the government's press releases, organised by Department and by date.

The Law Society site provides much current and topical information about the sections and work of the Society, including press releases, consultations, proposals and general news.

The Law Society Gazette provides the normal legal news and also a "breaking news" section with the latest news. You can also personalise the site to provide you with selected information each time you log on. The Gazette's Law Reports are available on the site.

The Lawyer provides daily news as well as the full content of each week's issue. There is also an archive of 5 years' past material which can be searched in several different ways.

Solicitors Journal has current news. There are several stories most days. Accessing, browsing and searching the news section is free of charge and there is no need even to "register". All the content of the latest issue, including in-depth articles and comment, is free of charge for seven days. After that, the archive search (which goes back to 2003) is only accessible to Solicitors Journal subscribers as part of the standard subscription. You can register for a regular (free) email newsletter.

Legal Week provides breaking news as well as all the main news stories from the printed journal. There is a 2 years' archive. There is a major jobs section with 1,500 jobs.

Solicitors Blog is an "umbrella" site for a number of existing and new blogs and also legal news, training, events, careers & directories, both UK based and worldwide. Doubling as an information portal, it also provides a variety of feeds from news and legal sector related sources. It is possible for the viewer to contribute their own material in various ways. The site is provided by Netlaw Media an established UK based conference and events organisation. Solicitors Blog was launched in September 2010 by Lord Digby Jones of Birmingham who called it a "one stop shop" for legal information.

Legal Technology Insider, the newsletter edited by Charles Christian, provides news, information on products and events, and analysis of IT in the legal world.

Linex Systems was established in 2002 in response to a growing problem faced by legal professionals: how to manage the vast amount of legal information available on the internet. They provide many ways to aggregate, sort, filter, select and "manage" information. The information is generally free to the end user and it is also free for law firms and other organizations to publish their articles on the website.

Mondaq is a provider of free legal and professional articles online and brings together knowledge and expertise supplied directly by hundreds of the world's leading professional advisors, covering over 70 countries. The various sections categorise information on the legislative and regulatory framework affecting business and investment in the UK and European Union, Eastern Europe, North America, South-East Asia & China, Africa and the Middle East and major offshore centres. The information is generally free to the end user (the providers of information pay fees to have their information disseminated in this way).

Legal Media Group is part of Euromoney Institutional Investor. The groups magazines include International Financial Law Review, International Tax Review and Managing Intellectual Property. The site combines the resources of the groups magazines, expert guides, directories and supplements this with added news, analysis, data and discussion that is only available online.

The International Law Office provides commentaries (called Newsletters) under key categories of commercial law (arbitration, banking, commercial property, company and so on) from 300 lawyers around the world. There are also commercial/legal overviews for each country, and a register of 2,000 firms which can be searched by area and by specialisation. There is also a section of news and "deals".

Simmons & Simmons (via their site elexica) offer a series of current awareness emails on the following subjects: Budget 2004, Commercial Contracts, Construction, Corporate, Corporate Recovery, Employment, Environment, EU Diary, Finance Litigation, Financial Services, Global Counsel Handbooks - Japan, Insurance, Intellectual Property, IT & E-commerce, Key UK Legal Developments, Pharmaceutical & Biotechnology, Property, Securities & Derivatives, and Tax.

UK Human Rights Blog is associated with One Crown Office Row's Human Rights Update, a database of 1,000 reports and commentaries on human rights dating back to 1998 with a weekly update co-ordinated by Chambers Academic Rosalind English. The cases are taken from domestic courts and the Strasbourg court involving human rights points that demonstrate the impact of the European Convention on domestic law and also explores the practical impact of these cases for practitioners. The blog is written by members of 1 Crown Office Row, for more immediate comment and news. The editorial team consists of Angus McCullough QC, Rosalind English and Adam Wagner and there are frequent sharp-edged postings. For example, on 28th May there were postings on medical records, libel reform, abolishing of the Infrastructure Planning Commission and child witnesses in the court system.

UK Supreme Court comes from Matrix Chambers and the Litigation Department of Olswang LLP. The authors are solicitors and barristers specialising in litigation and with a particular interest in the work of the House of Lords and the UK Supreme Court. Both Matrix and Olswang were instructed in cases decided by the historic final sitting of the Judicial Committee of the House of Lords in July, and members of Matrix also presented the first case in the Supreme Court when it commenced sitting in October 2009, concerning the legality of UN sanctions regimes which freeze the property and funds of suspected terrorists. The introduction to the blog says "This blog is dedicated to the UK Supreme Court. The UK Supreme Court is the UK's highest court; its judgments bind lower courts and thus shape the development of English Law. Since 1399, the Law Lords, the judges of the most senior court in the country, have sat within Parliament. From October 2009, however, they have moved to an independent court in the Middlesex Guildhall. To mark this historic development, this blog has been set up to provide commentary on the UK Supreme Court and its judgments." There are frequent postings of issues before the Supreme Court.