Internet Newsletter for Lawyers
January/February 2003, by Delia Venables

Online Services from LexisNexis Butterworths Scotland

A brief description provided by Butterworths

Butterworths Scots Law Direct is Scotland's premier portfolio of online information services, comprising: These services are available individually or as a complete library.

Laws of Scotland Online

Laws of Scotland Online is the only comprehensive narrative treatment of Scots law online. It is the electronic version of the Stair Memorial Encyclopaedia which is unrivalled as a starting point for ascertaining the law of Scotland on any subject.

The service contains all the current material from the encyclopaedia and in addition:

A single user licence to this indispensable reference source costs only £800.

Scottish Case Reports Direct

This service: Flexible subscription services are available - it is possible to subscribe to the whole service or to each series separately. Scottish Case Digests Online is provided free of charge to subscribers who subscribe to both or to either one of the criminal or civil reports.

Scottish Case Reports Direct is available for as little as £350 for a single user licence.

Scottish Legislation Direct

Scottish Legislation Direct is a free online service. It is updated daily, has easy search facilities and provides instant access to: No obligation, free trials are available for all of these services - call 0845 608 1188 for details.

Free training is available for subscribers.

Visit www.butterworthsscotland.com for more information, or contact customer services at our Edinburgh office on 0131 225 7828 or email scot.inquiries@lexisnexis.co.uk.

Review by John Craske of Dundas & Wilson

Butterworths is one of the UK’s largest legal publishers and is now part of the enormous Lexis Nexis Butterworths Tolley group. As with all of the legal publishers, Butterworths have a wide range of their publications and services available online.

Butterworths’ online legal services include many UK and English publications, from Halsbury’s Laws and All England Cases to Electronic Business Law and the Times Law Reports. However, the scope of this review is to look at the Scottish resources available from Butterworths and whether these Scottish resources are, by themselves, a deep enough resource for a Scottish solicitor.

The User Interface

All of Butterworths’ online services are based on the same user interface. This makes it easier to navigate around the different services and find the information you want. You can access the home page for each of the services from either the main Butterworths website or from its own web address.

Once you are into each service, the user interface is uncluttered and straightforward. It is possible to browse through a hierarchical tree of the volumes/chapters/cases in the panel on the left hand side (the “navigator”) or choose to search. The simple choices of “Search”, “Views”, “Print List” and “Help” are easy to use. Here is a brief description of each:

Search. The search function is excellent and finds that elusive balance between simplicity and power to help you find what you want. More experienced researchers who are used to full Boolean searches are not left out and can use all of the normal connectors and wildcards. For some services, additional search functions are available, to allow you to search either the publication in question or just the navigator. The search results screen is clear and shows you the context of the hits, which helps you to pick the result you want rather than having to trawl through each hit to decide.

Views. This enables the user to choose how to view the service. Once you have found the document you wish to read, you can view it in a full browser window, removing the navigator, which makes for easier on-screen reading.

Print List. At the foot of every document is a Print Management button that lets you add documents or whole sections to your own print list. The print list allows you to see the items you have chosen to print during the current session and remove anything that you don’t need. You can then print everything at once.

Help. The help function is comprehensive, although in my experience, the services are fairly intuitive and the first time I looked at the help function was when writing this review!

The Butterworths’ Scottish services are described in Scots Law Direct and Butterworths Scotland.

Laws of Scotland Online

The Stair Memorial Encyclopaedia has long been a favourite starting point for legal research and the online version takes this to a new level. It is possible to browse through any of the volumes and to drill down through the chapters and sections. However, it is the search function described above that makes the online service so valuable.

Where there is a reference to another section of the Laws of Scotland, a case or legislation, a direct link is included, which helps the user to jump directly to the other source, replicating how you would use the book in a library. The catch with this, of course, is that you need to subscribe to the relevant service from Butterworths before the full power of this feature comes to life. You only see links to the services that you subscribe to.

Scottish Case Reports Direct

The Scottish Criminal Case Reports and Scottish Civil Law Reports are now an important reporting source. As with the other services, the search function is excellent and the Case Digest (which comes free if you subscribe to one or both of the case report services) provides a useful summary of cases.

Scottish Legislation Direct

This contains the full amended legislation of the Scottish parliament and the Scotland Act and is free until November 2003. Having access to the full amended text is a huge step forward from my days as a trainee in the library with the original text, “Is It In Force?” and the statute citators.

The equivalent service for UK statutes is Legislation Direct (not included in this subscription). However, there is one large omission. Neither Scottish Legislation Direct nor Legislation Direct includes all of the Westminster statutes that only extend to Scotland (e.g. neither contain the Land Registration (Scotland) Act 1979). The official line from Butterworths is that they are “ … actively working on making available updated versions of the Scottish statutes made by the Westminster Parliament, but at this stage of the undertaking they are not able to specify a date when this will be available.”

Subscriptions costs are broadly comparable with the cost of the paper based publications, e.g. the total cost of a paper based subscription to Stair would be approx. £1,760 in year one and £800 subsequently (for the updates). For the online version, a single user licence is £800. If you wish to give access to a larger number of users the costs can rise rapidly, although there is obviously some flexibility when you buy more than a few licences.

Is Scots Law Direct Enough?

Scottish law is different from English law in many areas, but there are also areas where the law is consistent across the UK. By its very nature, devolution has emphasised this two tier approach. There are those matters that the Scottish parliament has the right to legislate over and those matters that are reserved to Westminster.

However, Scottish solicitors are not only concerned with Scottish legislation and cases. We regularly advise our clients on UK as well as Scottish law, for example in the reserved areas of Trade and Industry (which includes company law and competition) and Employment. It is just as important to have access to the UK legislation, commentary and cases that affect our clients. By itself, Scots law Direct is probably not enough unless you focus exclusively on Criminal matters.

In Summary:

Pros

  • Comprehensive coverage within the areas of the services
  • Reliable and up to date
  • Consolidated, as amended statutes
  • Powerful search
  • Cross-links to other services
  • Customised home page if you take several services
  • Training is available once you subscribe.

    Cons

  • Scottish legislation passed by Westminster is missing
  • Scottish Legislation Direct is only free until Nov. 2003
  • There is no Bill Tracker in Scottish Legislation Direct, as there is in the UK equivalent
  • Cross-links only become valuable if you subscribe to other services.

    John Craske is at Dundas & Wilson
    Email john.craske@dundas-wilson.com

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