Adam Tanel

The appellants appealed a motion judge's decision declaring that the limitation period for putative class members remained suspended under s. 28(1) of the Class Proceedings Act following the denial of class certification.

The Court of Appeal dismissed the appeal, holding that s. 28(1) provides an exhaustive list of circumstances that resume a limitation period, and denial of certification is not among them.

Consequently, the limitation period remains suspended indefinitely following a denial of certification, a result the court noted must be addressed by the Legislature.

This proposed class action, alleging human rights abuses in chocolate manufacturing, was commenced in Ontario.

The plaintiff also initiated a similar lawsuit in British Columbia.

The defendant, Hershey Canada Inc., brought a motion for an anti-suit injunction to stay the B.C. action.

Concurrently, the plaintiff sought the court's permission under section 29 of the Class Proceedings Act to discontinue the Ontario action, citing funding difficulties and B.C.'s no-costs jurisdiction.

The court, acting as case management judge, determined that both the anti-suit injunction motion and the discontinuance motion should be heard on the same day to address the issue of where the class action should proceed.

The decision outlines the scheduling for these motions, with the anti-suit injunction to be heard first.

Two competing consortiums of class counsel brought a carriage motion to determine who would represent the proposed class in a national class action against Marriott regarding a massive data breach.

The court evaluated the standard carriage factors, finding most to be neutral.

The determinative factor was the interrelationship of class actions in multiple jurisdictions.

The court favoured the Winder Action because its counsel did not concede the necessity of overlapping regional class actions and was prepared to use multi-jurisdictional protocols to resolve the overlapping claims, whereas the Kogut Action consortium planned to run multiple overlapping actions across Canada.

Carriage was granted to the Winder Action and the competing actions were stayed.