{"id":1020,"date":"2020-04-16T15:08:35","date_gmt":"2020-04-16T19:08:35","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/limitations.ca\/?p=1020"},"modified":"2020-04-16T15:09:06","modified_gmt":"2020-04-16T19:09:06","slug":"ontario-court-of-appeal-reviews-appropriateness-principles","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/limitations.ca\/?p=1020","title":{"rendered":"Ontario: Court of Appeal reviews appropriateness principles"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Court of Appeal decision Sosnowksi v. MacEwan Petroleum <\/em><\/a>provides a useful summary of s. 5(1)(a)(iv)<\/a> jurisprudence:<\/p>\n

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[<\/a>15]\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0This court\u2019s jurisprudence has developed certain principles for the interpretation and application of s. 5(1)(a)(iv).<\/p>\n

[<\/a>16]\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0First, the determination of whether a proceeding is an appropriate means to seek to remedy an injury, loss, or damage depends upon the specific factual and\/or statutory setting of each case:\u00a0Nasr Hospitality Services Inc. v. Intact Insurance<\/em>,\u00a02018 ONCA 725<\/span>,\u00a0142 O.R. (3d) 561<\/span><\/a>, at para.\u00a046<\/a><\/span>.<\/p>\n

\u00a0[<\/a>17]\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Second, this court has observed that two circumstances most often delay the date on which a claim is discovered under this subsection. The first is when the plaintiff relied on the defendant’s superior knowledge and expertise, especially where the defendant took steps to ameliorate the loss. The other situation is where an alternative dispute resolution process offers an adequate remedy, and it has not been completed:\u00a0Nasr<\/em>, at para. 50.<\/div>\n
\u00a0[<\/a>18]\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Third, Sharpe J.A. in\u00a0Markel Insurance Company of Canada v. ING Insurance Company of Canada<\/em>,\u00a02012 ONCA 218<\/span>,\u00a0109 O.R. (3d) 652<\/span><\/a>, at para.\u00a034<\/a><\/span>, provided the following guidance concerning the meaning of the term “appropriate”:<\/div>\n
<\/div>\n
This brings me to the question of when it would be \u201cappropriate\u201d to bring a proceeding within the meaning of s. 5 (1)(a)(iv) of the\u00a0Limitations Act<\/em>. Here as well, I fully accept that parties should be discouraged from rushing to litigation or arbitration and encouraged to discuss and negotiate claims. In my view, when s. 5 (1) (a)(iv) states that a claim is “discovered” only when “having a regard to the nature of the injury, loss or damage, a proceeding would be an appropriate means to seek to remedy it,” the word “appropriate” must mean\u00a0legally appropriate<\/em>. To give \u201cappropriate\u201d an evaluative gloss allowing a party to delay the commencement of proceedings for some tactical or other reason beyond two years from the date the claim is fully ripened and requiring the court to assess the tone and tenor of communications in search of a clear denial would, in my opinion, inject an unacceptable element of uncertainty into the law of limitation of actions. [Emphasis in original.]<\/div>\n

[<\/a>19]\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0In other words, appropriate means whether it is legally appropriate to bring an action. Appropriate does not include an evaluation of whether a civil proceeding will succeed.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

It\u2019s also another addition to the jurisprudence considering the impact of a criminal proceeding on the timeliness of a civil proceeding. The outcome of a criminal proceeding may assist in assessing the merits of a civil proceeding, but that\u2019s not a material consideration in the limitations analysis:<\/p>\n

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[<\/a>28]\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0The appellant\u2019s principal submission is that he should have been permitted to wait until the criminal proceedings concluded so that he could evaluate his chances of success in litigation. He argues that litigation is an expensive and risky proposition, and he should not have been forced to commence a civil proceeding until he knew that he had a chance of success. This argument, of course, is precisely what this court in\u00a0Markel<\/em>\u00a0said a plaintiff is not permitted to do.<\/p>\n

\u00a0[<\/a>29]\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0If such an evaluative analysis could effectively stop the running of the limitation period, questions will necessarily follow regarding the nature of that analysis and the factors that could be considered. For example, is it open to a plaintiff to argue that he or she can await the outcome of a related discipline process in a professional negligence claim? May a potential plaintiff commence a claim many years after the events if there is a change in the law that increases his or her chances of success? If a critical witness goes missing and is later discovered, is it open to the plaintiff to assert that he or she did not know whether it was appropriate to bring an action until the witness was found?<\/div>\n<\/blockquote>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Court of Appeal decision Sosnowksi v. MacEwan Petroleum provides a useful summary of s. 5(1)(a)(iv) jurisprudence: [15]\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0This court\u2019s jurisprudence has developed certain principles for the interpretation and application of s. 5(1)(a)(iv). [16]\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0First, the determination of whether a proceeding is an appropriate means to seek to remedy an injury, loss, or damage depends … Continue reading Ontario: Court of Appeal reviews appropriateness principles<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[400,144,9,45,43],"class_list":["post-1020","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-ontario","tag-criminal-proceedings","tag-discoverability-principles","tag-discovery","tag-ontario-act-s-51aiv","tag-ontario-court-of-appeal"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/limitations.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1020","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/limitations.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/limitations.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/limitations.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/limitations.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1020"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/limitations.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1020\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1022,"href":"http:\/\/limitations.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1020\/revisions\/1022"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/limitations.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1020"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/limitations.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1020"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/limitations.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1020"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}