Eunice Machado

The plaintiff corporation sued the provincial government for $2.25 billion after the government imposed a moratorium on offshore wind farm development in Lake Ontario.

The government moved under Rule 21 to strike the statement of claim for disclosing no reasonable cause of action.

The court held that the moratorium constituted a core policy decision grounded in public policy considerations and therefore could not ground liability in tort.

Claims for breach of contract, unjust enrichment, expropriation, negligence, negligent misrepresentation, misfeasance in public office, and intentional infliction of economic harm were all found to be inadequately pleaded or legally unsustainable.

The statement of claim was struck and the action dismissed without leave to amend.

A proposed intervener sought leave under Rule 13.01 of the Rules of Civil Procedure to intervene as an added party in a defendant’s pending motion for summary judgment in a civil action.

The proposed intervener was the representative plaintiff in a certified class proceeding involving overlapping factual allegations but different legal theories from the individual plaintiffs’ action.

Although the court found that common issues of fact existed between the proceedings, it concluded that the proposed intervener had no direct interest in the subject matter of the individual action and would not be adversely affected by its outcome.

The court further held that the proposed intervener would not provide a useful contribution to the determination of the summary judgment motion and that intervention would unnecessarily expand the scope of the motion and increase costs.

Leave to intervene was therefore denied.