{"id":633,"date":"2017-10-05T12:11:59","date_gmt":"2017-10-05T16:11:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/limitations.ca\/?p=633"},"modified":"2017-10-05T12:11:59","modified_gmt":"2017-10-05T16:11:59","slug":"ontario-no-limitation-period-without-a-claim","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/limitations.ca\/?p=633","title":{"rendered":"Ontario: no limitation period without a claim"},"content":{"rendered":"

Justice Emery’s decision in Inzola Main Street Inc. v. Brampton (City of) <\/em><\/a>is a statement of a very often overlooked but fundamental principle of the Ontario limitations scheme: there is no claim, and therefore no applicable limitation period, until the claimant suffers damage:<\/p>\n

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[<\/a>51]\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0Inzola has made the basic submission on this motion that a limitation period for damages claim does not commence running until damage actually occurs. Mr. Svonkin refers to the definition of \u201cclaim\u201d in\u00a0section 1<\/a>\u00a0of the\u00a0Limitations Act 2002<\/a><\/i>\u00a0as \u201ca claim to remedy an injury, loss or damage that occurred as a result of an act or omission\u201d. This language is consistent with\u00a0section 5(1)<\/a>(a) that sets out the components of the discoverability rule, and provides that a claim is discovered on the earlier of the day on which the person with the claim first knew that the injury loss or damage \u201chad occurred\u201d.<\/p>\n

[<\/a>52]\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0From reading the definition \u201cclaim\u201d in\u00a0section 1<\/a>\u00a0that a claim must relate to damage, and to the qualifier \u201chad occurred\u201d to injury, loss or damage in section 5(1)(a)(i), the legislature has employed definitive language to require that the damage to which the claim relates must have taken place for the injury, loss or damage to be known. Where damage is an element of a cause of action or claim, a limitation period can only commence when the person with the claim suffers some damage that has occurred, and that damage is discoverable:\u00a0Peixeiro v. Haberman<\/i>,\u00a01997 CanLII 325 (SCC)<\/a>,\u00a0[1997] S.C.J. No. 31<\/span>, at paras. 18 and 36<\/span>, andPickering Square Inc. v. Trillium College Inc.<\/i>,\u00a0[2016] O.J. No. 1118<\/span>, at para. 33<\/span>.<\/p>\n

[<\/a>53]\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0The prospect of injury, loss or damage at some future date is not sufficient to commence a limitation running. A claim does not arise only because a person recognizes or is concerned that they\u00a0may<\/i>\u00a0suffer that injury, loss or damage at some point in the future. Justice Belobaba explained it this way in\u00a0IPEX v. Lubrizol<\/i>,\u00a02012 ONSC 2717<\/span>\u00a0(CanLII)<\/a>, at para. 22<\/span>:<\/p>\n

22.\u00a0\u00a0 In my view, it is self-evident that the injury, loss or damage that \u201chas occurred\u201d must be injury, loss or damage that was sustained by the person with the claim. It is also, in my view, a self-evident proposition of modern limitations law that the clock begins to run with actual harm (known or discoverable) and not just the possibility of future harm. The latter proposition doesn\u2019t make any sense either in terms of public policy or otherwise.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

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Justice Emery’s decision in Inzola Main Street Inc. v. Brampton (City of) is a statement of a very often overlooked but fundamental principle of the Ontario limitations scheme: there is no claim, and therefore no applicable limitation period, until the claimant suffers damage: [51]\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0Inzola has made the basic submission on this motion … Continue reading Ontario: no limitation period without a claim<\/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":[202,376,377,310],"class_list":["post-633","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-ontario","tag-claim","tag-accrual-of-a-claim","tag-fundamental-principles","tag-ontario-act-s-1"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/limitations.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/633","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/limitations.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/limitations.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/limitations.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/limitations.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=633"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/limitations.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/633\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":634,"href":"https:\/\/limitations.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/633\/revisions\/634"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/limitations.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=633"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/limitations.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=633"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/limitations.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=633"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}