Legal Research Services On-line -
WestlawUK

Westlaw UK
The UK's online legal information service

News as of June 5th 2007
Westlaw UK has now launched a new version of their service. New facilities include these:

  • Case law and legislation analysis services that enable lawyers to identify in one document all the direct and indirect legal materials relating to a case or piece of legislation
  • A fully browseable table of contents offering the most direct access to key content
  • A new ‘Point-in-Time’ facility to see how a particular law stood on a specific day in the past or how that provision has changed over time
  • A ‘breadcrumb trail’ tracking every research step to help with complicated research projects
  • Compatibility with BlackBerry devices – so services can be accessed whilst on the move
    Apparently, Sweet & Maxwell’s development teams have devoted a combined 17,604 days to the redesign! They worked closely with customers across the UK.

    Key Features

  • Cases back to 1865 with over 180,000 law reports in full text
  • Fully comprehensive and consolidated legislation dating back to 1267
  • Finest analytical commentary available as additional content or separate specialist practice area solutions
  • Vast collection of journals, supported by the Legal Journals Index
  • EU materials including CELEX and access to International materials
  • International news and business information
  • Current Awareness service updated three times a day
  • Powerful and intuitive search functionality
  • Intranet solutions for customised knowledge management systems
  • 24-hour legally qualified customer support team

    Case Law

    Westlaw UK is built upon a vast collection of case law including over 180,000 full text case reports from the UKs leading and recognised brand names including the official Law Reports, The Weekly Law Reports & Industrial Case Reports from the ICLR, Session Cases from the SCLR, Lloyd's Law Reports, Criminal Appeal Reports, Reports of Patent Cases and Transcripts from Smith Bernal.

    The case law is supported by a powerful 'Analysis' service which allows you to view in one easy-to-read document all the key points of the full text and key citations relevant to a case.

    Legislation

    Westlaw UK's legislation service includes fully comprehensive and consolidated legislation dating back to 1267. A unique versioning facility allows you to view incremental changes made to the law over the passage of time - from its inception right up to the present day. Available from 1991 for Acts and 1948 for Statutory Instruments.

    Legislation Analysis allows you to view in one easy-to-read document all the key points that relate to a legislative provision.

    Expert Commentary

    Leading analytical options are available to supplement your Westlaw UK subscription including: Westlaw UK also offers a number of practice area solutions, incorporating cases, legislation and expert analytical commentary from leading titles including Archbold, The White Book, Woodfall, Copinger and more. These are available as separate subscription services.

    Journal Archive

    Westlaw UK features the most comprehensive collection of full text journals available anywhere. This includes thousands of articles from 36 specialist Sweet & Maxwell journals including Criminal Law Review, European Intellectual Property Review, Journal of Business Law and Landlord and Tenant Review. With a further five journals from Tottel Publishing and 21 from Oxford University Press, it is an impressive collection.

    All journals are indexed in the Legal Journals Index (LJI) - an extremely popular service which is totally unique to Westlaw UK. All material is categorised with Sweet & Maxwell's Legal Taxonomy and you can see at a glance the key points of an article along with direct links to relevant case law and legislation, plus links to the full text where available.

    Current Awareness

    The Current Awareness service is updated three times a day, Monday to Friday, providing summaries of same day information from the courts, parliament, government departments and legal journals.

    The special alerting features enables you to choose from a list of over 100 subjects and then select the frequency, delivery and format for when and how you would like to receive this information. You can also choose to be updated on the legal status of a particular subject or legal material.

    Superior Functionality

    Westlaw UK is entirely designed to reflect the way that legal research is carried out in the UK. All content is interlinked, cross-referenced and built on a platform that is heavily optimised to reflect the research and information requirements of UK legal professionals.

    Westlaw UK Customer Support - 0800 028 2200

    Help on technical, subscription or research related questions is available 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. Call the Customer Support Team on 0800 028 2200 or email customer.service@westlaw.co.uk.

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