Family and Matrimonial Law

The parties separated when their child was six months old.

The mother relocated to Guelph with the child, while the father remained in Brampton.

At trial, the parties agreed the mother would have sole decision-making responsibility, leaving the father's parenting schedule and his request for a reduction in child support due to high access costs as the remaining issues.

The court considered the child's learning difficulties, the father's commute, and the recommendations of the Office of the Children's Lawyer.

The court ordered alternating weekend parenting time for the father from Friday after school to Sunday evening, plus a mid-week community visit in Guelph.

The father's request for a reduction in child support was dismissed.

A family law trial concerning decision-making responsibility, parenting time, and child support for a young child.

The court found credible evidence of intimate partner violence, coercive control, and inappropriate sexual conduct by the father, concluding that the child’s safety required strict supervision of parenting time.

The mother was granted sole decision-making responsibility, authority over travel and identifying documents, and a restraining order limiting the father’s proximity and communication.

Applying the Drygala framework, the court found the father intentionally underemployed and imputed income progressively over three years for child support purposes.

The applicant mother brought a motion to strike the respondent father's pleadings due to his ongoing failure to comply with a court order for financial disclosure.

The parties had a 2014 separation agreement requiring a review of child support after four years.

Since 2018, the father, who is the sole shareholder of a landscaping company, repeatedly failed to provide adequate corporate and personal financial disclosure.

Applying the framework from Mullin v. Sherlock, the court found the father's non-compliance to be deliberate and extensive, and his Answer to raise no reasonable defence.

The court struck the father's pleadings and permitted the mother to proceed to an uncontested trial for child support.

Following a trial regarding parenting time where the respondent was successful in obtaining an order for supervised access, the respondent sought costs of $10,960.

The applicant argued against a costs order due to her limited income from ODSP and her role as the primary caregiver.

The court found the applicant had acted unreasonably during the litigation but acknowledged her financial circumstances and the potential impact on the child.

The court awarded the respondent partial indemnity costs of $4,800, payable at $200 per month.

The applicant father sought sole decision-making responsibility and primary residence of the parties' three-year-old child.

The respondent mother sought joint decision-making with final authority and the continuation of their shared parenting schedule.

The court found that the father had engaged in a pattern of coercive and controlling behaviour towards the mother and the mother of his second child.

The mother had maintained sobriety for four years and was a stable, loving parent.

The court ordered joint decision-making with the mother having final authority, continued the shared parenting schedule, and ordered communication through Our Family Wizard.

In a child protection trial, the applicant society sought to qualify a psychologist as an expert in assessing the risk of harm to children if access by their father was supervised by their paternal grandfather.

Following a voir dire, the court refused to qualify the witness as an expert in this area, finding that assessing access supervisors is not a recognized psychological specialty, lacks an established protocol, and the witness's report raised concerns regarding impartiality.

However, the court noted the assessment report remained admissible as evidence under section 98(12) of the Child, Youth and Family Services Act.

Following a trial regarding decision-making responsibility and parenting time under the Children's Law Reform Act, the applicant mother sought costs.

The court found the mother was largely successful in her claims, obtaining sole decision-making responsibility and limiting the father's parenting time.

The court declined to award costs for steps taken before the trial judge's involvement, as they were not reserved.

Considering the mother's reasonable position, her informal offer to settle, and the father's failure to reassess his claims, the court awarded the mother partial indemnity costs of $4,719.14.

The parties, unmarried parents of a three-year-old child, separated after a brief relationship marked by high conflict and incidents of domestic violence.

The mother sought sole decision-making responsibility and permission to relocate with the child from North Bay to Sudbury, while the father sought joint decision-making and equal parenting time in North Bay.

The court granted the mother sole decision-making responsibility, finding that the parties' inability to communicate and the father's lack of trust made joint decision-making unworkable.

The court also authorized the relocation to Sudbury, concluding it was in the child's best interests given the mother's role as primary caregiver, her need for family support, and the father's failure to foster a cooperative relationship.

The father was granted generous parenting time and ordered to pay child support.

The father brought a motion to change a final order to seek parenting time with his child at a supervised access centre.

The mother opposed the motion, citing a history of domestic violence and the father's unresolved anger issues, and sought a restraining order and child support.

Relying on an Office of the Children's Lawyer report and evidence of the father's past violent conduct, the court found it was not in the child's best interests to grant access at this time.

The father's motion was dismissed, access was suspended, a non-communication order was issued, and child support was ordered based on the father's fluctuating income.

The applicant mother sought an order terminating the respondent father's access to their two-year-old child, citing his past drug use, abusive behavior, and inconsistent attendance at supervised visits.

The father sought to continue supervised access.

The court found that while the father's inconsistent attendance was concerning, the mother had unilaterally terminated access contrary to an interim order.

Applying the best interests of the child test, the court held that the circumstances did not meet the high threshold required to terminate the parent-child relationship and ordered continued supervised access.

The applicant father sought liberal and generous access to his 13-year-old son, an order preventing the respondent mother from travelling outside Canada with the child without his consent, and the rescission of a temporary restraining order.

The court found that the father's erratic, aggressive, and harassing behaviour had caused the estrangement from his son, and that the child did not wish to have contact with him.

The court dismissed the father's application, leaving access to the mother's discretion and the child's wishes, granted a final restraining order against the father, and permitted the mother to travel internationally with the child without the father's consent.

The father overpaid child support and was owed a refund, but he had also failed to pay two previous costs orders to the mother.

One of the costs orders omitted a postjudgment interest clause.

The court amended the 2006 costs order nunc pro tunc to include the interest clause, finding its omission was a mistake.

The court declined to relieve the father from paying the costs and interest, finding the issue was res judicata and it lacked jurisdiction to vary the interest.

The court also awarded the father prejudgment interest at 5% on his child support overpayment.

After setting off the amounts, the mother was ordered to pay the father the net balance.

Following a summary judgment that awarded custody and prospective child support to the mother, a focused trial was held to determine her claims for retroactive child support and section 7 expenses from 2012 to 2017.

Applying the D.B.S. framework, the court found the father engaged in blameworthy conduct by underpaying support, but noted the mother's delay and ambivalence in pursuing her claims, as well as the father's financial hardship.

Balancing these factors, the court ordered retroactive child support and section 7 expenses starting January 1, 2016, resulting in $8,276 in additional arrears.

To mitigate hardship, the father was permitted to pay the total arrears at a rate of $150 per month.

The applicant brought a motion for summary judgment seeking an order to place two children in extended society care.

The children had been in care for five years after being abandoned by the mother.

The father, who had a positive relationship with the children, was unable to secure suitable housing despite significant support and extensions of time.

The court found no genuine issue for trial, noting that poverty was not the determining factor, but rather the father's lack of problem-solving, judgment, and motivation.

The motion was granted, placing the children in extended care with flexible access for the father.

The applicant society brought a motion for temporary care and custody of six children, three of whom resided in Ontario and three in Algeria.

The society alleged historical abuse by an older sibling and feared the parents would surreptitiously relocate the Ontario children to Algeria.

The parents opposed the motion, seeking the return of the Ontario children to their care.

The court found it had no jurisdiction over the three children residing in Algeria.

Regarding the three children in Ontario, the court found the society's evidence fell short of establishing reasonable grounds to believe the children would suffer harm if returned to their parents.

The court ordered the Ontario children returned to the parents' care subject to a supervision order with strict conditions regarding travel and relocation.

This was a costs endorsement following a family law appeal.

The court held that success on the appeal was divided and ordered that each party bear their own costs of the appeal.

The court further declined to interfere with the trial judge's costs award, finding it reasonable and noting that the result of the appeal would have only a modest monetary impact on the trial decision.

The appellant appealed the dismissal of his motion to change support obligations and the granting of the respondent’s cross-motion fixing child and spousal support arrears, ongoing spousal support, and security for support payments during default.

The court held that the consent order required the parties to be bound by the accountant’s calculation of income for support purposes and rejected the submission that a de novo review of financial circumstances was required.

The appellant’s argument based on the child no longer being a child of the marriage did not justify reducing spousal support in light of the wording of the consent order.

The order providing security for support was upheld, the cross-appeal was dismissed, and costs were fixed in favour of the respondent.

The appellant challenged a family law order setting aside a marriage contract, arguing the trial was unfair because of his hearing impairment.

The Court of Appeal held that the trial judge accommodated the self-represented appellant and that the record did not support any unfairness affecting the outcome.

The court further held it was open to the trial judge to conclude there had been inadequate financial disclosure and that the responding party did not understand the nature or consequences of the contract.

Fresh evidence was admitted for the limited purpose of understanding the hearing-impairment argument, but the appeal was dismissed.

The appellants challenged the trial judge's findings on support, equalization, and ownership of the Britannia Street home in a family property dispute.

The Court of Appeal held there was no basis to interfere with the trial judge's reasons accepting an earlier attribution of income, attributing financial responsibility for a vehicle, and finding that one appellant owned the home rather than holding it in trust for the other.

The appeal was dismissed.

The respondent was awarded appeal costs of $1,500 inclusive of disbursements and HST.

Following a family trial between self-represented former spouses, the court determined equalization, spousal support, child support, and related accounting disputes arising from mortgage refinancing proceeds and carrying costs of the matrimonial home.

The court rejected the moving party's request for unequal distribution, attributed equal value in the matrimonial home to each spouse, and ordered the home sold because the responding party had not proven an ability to buy out the other interest.

The court found the responding party remained entitled to spousal support on compensatory and non-compensatory grounds, but fixed support at a nominal amount of one dollar per year due to the inadequate record regarding current means and employment limitations.

Child support arrears were recalculated under the Federal Child Support Guidelines, and both parties received specified credits to be applied on distribution of sale proceeds and equalization.