You probably buried your head in law books for months on end when you were at law school, but outside the world of academia, gaining access to accurate, reliable and up-to-date UK law and insights can be a tough nut to crack.
To do their jobs effectively and efficiently, all lawyers and legal support staff need a quality legal database and legal research tools to access quick and comprehensive legislation, case law and commentary.
Not convinced? Here are five reasons why:
The best thing about having a legal database is the time saved. Instead of scanning through physical law books, or relying on Google, a legal database will allow you to quickly search thousands of cases, hundreds of law books and all the precedents you need.
To give an example, LexisLibrary has exclusive content including Halsbury’s Laws of England, The Family Court Practice (The Red book), Atkin’s Court Forms, Gore-Browne and many more. It also gives you access to more than 600,000 cases alongside commentary on cases, forms and precedents.
To build strong relationships with clients or stakeholders, you need to ensure the information you are providing them with is 100% accurate – which unfortunately can’t be achieved through Google alone.
A legal database will ensure the law you are citing is accurate and current – and a quality database will also come with links to cases, judgments and law reports.
The law is continuously evolving – and lawyers need to do everything in their power to keep up with it.
A legal research database will allow you to easily pinpoint and comprehend legislative changes. In particular, access to Supreme Court judgements, High Court judgments, Crown Court judgements and the Privy Council judgements.
LexisLibrary, for example, has a traffic light system that shows the status of legislation and cases so you are always using up‐to‐date law. All court judgements in England are available within 24 hours of being handed down, giving you access to case digests and enactments published throughout the day. Historical versioning and legislative timelines will let you see exactly what has changed in legislation over time. You’ll also receive email alerts to immediately inform you of legislative changes.
In the wake of Covid-19, the importance of having remote access to legal knowledge is perhaps more obvious than ever.
A legal database lets you and your team easily access the latest legal knowledge, research and reports wherever they are.
Understanding and interpreting the law is something even the most experienced lawyers can struggle with – but a quality legal database will make information easily available for people from all levels of experience, with guided introductions, commentary and annotations.
With LexisLibrary, your lawyers can quickly become experts in areas that stray outside their practice area or niche, and support staff can rapidly research law by ensuring they’re seeing all related content in one place.
When searching for a quality legal database, it's important to look out for the following features:
After signing up for a free trial, you'll have access to:
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