2 total
Set-aside bid failed despite procedural breach; no material basis for new arbitration.
The moving parties sought to set aside two international arbitral awards under Article 34 of the UNCITRAL Model Law, alleging inability to present their case, excess of jurisdiction, and inadequate reasons.
The court found a procedural fairness breach where the arbitrator made a proper-party finding without submissions, but held the issue was not material in context because separate findings eliminated personal liability on other grounds.
The court rejected the jurisdiction and insufficiency-of-reasons challenges, emphasizing the narrow scope of intervention and deference to international arbitral awards.
Exercising discretion under Article 34, the court declined to order a new arbitration.
The application was dismissed.
An arbitrator's failure to disclose an unrelated engagement with counsel for one party does not objectively create a reasonable apprehension of bias under the UNCITRAL Model Law.
The Court of Appeal for Ontario allowed an appeal concerning an international commercial arbitration award.
The application judge had set aside the award due to a reasonable apprehension of bias by the arbitrator, who had accepted a second, unrelated arbitration engagement from the appellants' counsel without disclosure to the respondents.
The Court of Appeal held that the application judge erred by applying a subjective test for disclosure and bias, rather than the objective test mandated by the UNCITRAL Model Law.
The Court found no breach of the arbitrator's legal duty to disclose and no reasonable apprehension of bias, as the second arbitration involved no common parties or overlapping issues, and the arbitrator was not aware of the parties' subjective disclosure expectations.
The matter was remitted to the Superior Court to address other grounds for attacking the award.
