Frank Cesario

The plaintiffs, comprising 473 individuals, brought an action against the Ontario government and 54 non-governmental healthcare entities, challenging COVID-19 vaccination policies and public health measures.

The defendants moved to strike the statement of claim.

The court granted the motion, finding it lacked jurisdiction over unionized employees and physicians whose claims were subject to exclusive statutory regimes.

The court also found the action to be an abuse of process due to its prejudicial scope and frivolous pleadings.

Furthermore, the court held that the statement of claim failed to disclose a reasonable cause of action for conspiracy, intimidation, intentional infliction of mental anguish, and Charter breaches.

The claim was struck in its entirety, with leave to amend.

The defendant, Ontario Power Generation Inc. (OPG), brought a motion to strike four causes of action from the plaintiff M.P.'s Amended Amended Statement of Claim: negligent investigation, intrusion upon seclusion by way of vicarious liability, breach of fiduciary duty, and harassment.

The court granted OPG's motion, finding that the claims for negligent investigation and breach of fiduciary duty failed to meet the established legal tests, the claim for vicarious liability for intrusion upon seclusion lacked sufficient connection to employment, and there is no recognized common law tort of harassment applicable to the facts pleaded.

Costs were awarded to the defendant.

A school board principal accessed and photographed private communications stored on a cloud-based personal log that was open on a board-owned laptop.

The teachers' union grieved the resulting written reprimands, alleging a breach of privacy rights.

A labour arbitrator dismissed the grievance applying the arbitral balancing-of-interests framework without conducting a s. 8 Charter analysis.

The Supreme Court held unanimously that the Charter applies to Ontario public school boards under the first branch of the Eldridge framework, as public education is an inherently governmental function.

The majority held the arbitrator fatally erred by failing to apply the s. 8 framework, and quashed the award.

The concurring minority would have applied a reasonableness standard and found the arbitrator's reliance on the contents of the log to assess the biographical core was unreasonable.

The appeal was dismissed with costs.

The applicant unions sought interim injunctions to restrain the respondent employers from enforcing mandatory COVID-19 vaccination policies pending the outcome of labour arbitrations.

The court dismissed the Sinai application on the basis that the labour arbitration process provided an adequate alternative remedy, precluding the exercise of the court's residual jurisdiction.

The court dismissed the TTC application on the merits of the injunction test, finding that the loss of employment or income did not constitute irreparable harm and that the balance of convenience strongly favoured the employer's obligation to protect public health and workplace safety.

The appellant appealed a summary judgment dismissing his action against the Ontario Ombudsman.

The motion judge proceeded in the appellant's absence after finding he knew of the motion and chose not to participate.

The motion judge dismissed the action because the respondent was immune from proceedings absent bad faith, and the appellant provided no evidence of bad faith.

The Court of Appeal found no error in the motion judge's discretionary decision to proceed or in granting summary judgment, and dismissed the appeal.

Roch Longueépée, largely successful in his appeal, sought partial indemnity costs from the University of Waterloo and the Human Rights Tribunal of Ontario (HRTO).

The Court of Appeal for Ontario found Longueépée entitled to costs against the University, fixing them at $25,000.

The court also awarded costs against the HRTO, fixed at $7,500, because its arguments on the standard of review and request for a five-judge panel expanded the scope of the appeal, even though its position was not taken in bad faith.

Following the dismissal of the plaintiff's Rule 21 motion, the successful defendants sought costs on a substantial indemnity scale, arguing the motion was ill-conceived.

The court held that while the motion was premised on an erroneous view of the law, the plaintiff's conduct was not reprehensible, scandalous, or outrageous.

The court awarded the defendants costs on a partial indemnity scale in the amount of $9,500.

A provincially incorporated contractor providing construction services to federally regulated telecommunications companies sought to challenge a provincial labour relations board's certification of its construction technicians as a provincially regulated bargaining unit.

The contractor argued that its construction technicians performed work vital, essential, or integral to federal undertakings and should therefore be subject to federal labour jurisdiction.

The Court of Appeal reversed the Divisional Court's decision, holding that the presumption of provincial jurisdiction over labour relations was not displaced.

The court found that the federal undertaking (Rogers) was not dependent on the contractor's construction technicians, and that the proper focus in derivative jurisdiction analysis is whether the federal undertaking is dependent on the particular employees in question, not whether the work performed is generally important to the federal undertaking.

This is a costs endorsement following an appeal of a trial judgment in an employment law matter.

The appellant challenged the trial judge's costs award of $82,600 to the respondent, arguing for either no costs or a reduced amount of $20,000.

The respondent sought to maintain the trial judge's award.

The Court of Appeal allowed the appeal on the merits but reduced the costs award to $40,000, considering that while the respondent succeeded on the constructive dismissal claim, the trial was significantly lengthened by unsuccessful claims and the respondent failed to proceed under the simplified procedure despite being eligible to do so after other claims were struck out.

Two separate representative actions were brought on behalf of approximately 800 terminated employees of bankrupt meat processing companies.

The first action (Caetano) was brought by a union representative on behalf of 700 unionized employees; the second (Abreu) was brought by non-union employees on behalf of approximately 100 non-unionized employees.

The defendants moved to stay the Caetano action on jurisdictional grounds and to strike the representative elements of both actions as statute-barred.

The motion judge stayed the Caetano action and struck the representative aspect of the Caetano action but allowed the Abreu action to proceed.

On appeal, the Court of Appeal dismissed the Caetano appeal and allowed the Abreu appeal, striking the representative aspect of the Abreu action as well.

Two separate representative actions were brought on behalf of approximately 800 terminated employees of bankrupt meat processing companies.

The first action (Caetano) was brought by a union representative on behalf of 700 unionized employees; the second (Abreu) was brought by non-union employees on behalf of approximately 100 non-unionized employees.

The defendants moved to stay the Caetano action on jurisdictional grounds and to strike the representative elements of both actions as statute-barred.

The motion judge stayed the Caetano action and struck the representative aspect of the Caetano action but allowed the Abreu action to proceed.

On appeal, the Court of Appeal dismissed the Caetano appeal and allowed the Abreu appeal, striking the representative aspect of the Abreu action as well.

The appellant appealed a trial judgment awarding the respondent damages for constructive dismissal in the amount of $75,723.64, punitive damages of $100,000, and costs of $82,600.

The respondent, a Security Shift Supervisor at a casino, was suspended without pay after being investigated for alleged theft from the casino's lost and found facilities.

The Court of Appeal found that while the suspension itself was justified, the suspension without pay was not reasonably justified at the time it was imposed.

The court determined that the appropriate notice period was seven months, not the 17 months the trial judge had awarded.

The court also set aside the punitive damages award, finding that the trial judge failed to properly analyze whether compensatory damages were inadequate to achieve the objectives of retribution, deterrence, and condemnation.

The appellant appealed from a Superior Court order dismissing his action as frivolous, vexatious, and an abuse of process.

The motion judge found that the action amounted to an attempt to relitigate unsuccessful proceedings before the Canadian Human Rights Commission, Canada Labour Code adjudicator, Federal Court, and Federal Court of Appeal, with bald allegations of fraud, obstruction of justice, blackmail, and criminal conduct lacking factual foundation.

The Court of Appeal upheld the dismissal, finding no merit in the appellant's three grounds of appeal: unlawful application of Rule 2.1.01(1), malicious use of language by the motion judge, and alleged infringement of Charter rights.

The plaintiff in a wrongful dismissal action brought a motion to strike two paragraphs of the defendant's statement of defence, arguing they improperly referred to a without prejudice termination offer.

The court dismissed the motion, finding that because the plaintiff pleaded bad faith and claimed punitive damages regarding the defendant's conduct at termination, the defendant was entitled to plead the termination offer to answer those allegations.

The termination offer was deemed relevant and an exception to settlement privilege applied.

The appellant appealed the dismissal of his wrongful dismissal claim on summary judgment.

The appellant was hired by Atomic Energy of Canada but was terminated after providing false information on his security clearance questionnaire and during the hiring process.

He failed to disclose his employment at Ivaco Rolling Mills and misrepresented his whereabouts when contacted about an employment offer.

The Court of Appeal upheld the summary judgment dismissal, finding that the breach of honesty went to the core of the employment relationship, particularly given the national security context and the appellant's access to nuclear facilities and sensitive information.

The appellant appealed a trial judgment dismissing her claim for survivor pension benefits following the death of Michael Shestowsky, a former employee of the respondent.

The appellant claimed entitlement to survivor benefits as a "spouse" under the Pension Benefits Act, which requires living together in a conjugal relationship for at least three years before retirement.

The trial judge found the appellant was not an eligible spouse based on objective, contemporaneous evidence including a cohabitation agreement stating the parties intended to commence cohabiting, pension election forms confirming no eligible spouse, and tax returns.

The Court of Appeal upheld the dismissal, finding the trial judge properly applied the law and his factual findings were amply supported by evidence.

A family-owned meat processing business went bankrupt, terminating approximately 800 employees.

Two representative actions were commenced: one by Sam Caetano for unionized employees and another by Debbie and Alex Abreu for non-unionized employees, alleging wrongful dismissal, common employment, conspiracy, and oppression against solvent related companies and individuals.

The defendants brought motions to stay the Caetano action for lack of jurisdiction and to dismiss both representative actions as time-barred.

The court granted the jurisdiction motion, staying the Caetano action entirely, finding that claims by unionized employees under a collective agreement fall within the exclusive jurisdiction of labour tribunals.

The court also granted in part the limitations motion, dismissing the Caetano representative action as time-barred because the required Rule 12.08 representation order was not obtained prior to commencement.

However, the Abreu representative action, brought under Rule 10.01, was found not to be time-barred, but was allowed to proceed only on the condition that the plaintiffs forthwith obtain a representation order.

The plaintiff sued for wrongful dismissal after being terminated from his position as an Industrial Safety Specialist at a nuclear facility.

The defendant employer brought a motion for summary judgment to dismiss the action, arguing there was just cause for termination because the plaintiff lied on a mandatory security clearance questionnaire about his employment history and lied about his whereabouts during the hiring process.

The court applied the contextual approach to employee dishonesty and found that the plaintiff's deliberate deception in a highly regulated national security context destroyed the employment relationship.

The court granted summary judgment and dismissed the action, finding no genuine issue for trial.

The applicant sought a declaration that the respondents were not entitled to treat the retirement of his transition support loan as a taxable benefit and issue a T4.

The applicant argued that the loan documents, specifically a Q&A document, implied the loan would be retired without financial consequence to him.

The court found no ambiguity in the loan documents and held that they did not restrict the manner in which the respondents could retire the loan.

The application was dismissed, as the court could not rewrite the contract to impose an obligation to retire the loan tax-free.

Following an earlier decision striking the plaintiff’s statement of claim as disclosing no reasonable cause of action and finding the action frivolous and vexatious, the court addressed the issue of costs.

The defendant sought $10,367.59 on a partial indemnity basis.

Applying s. 131(1) of the Courts of Justice Act and the factors under Rule 57.01 of the Rules of Civil Procedure, the court held that a successful party is generally entitled to costs unless strong reasons exist otherwise.

Although the plaintiff asserted an inability to pay, the court found that the defendant had incurred additional unnecessary expense due to the plaintiff’s conduct and that the motion’s outcome was reasonably predictable in light of related prior litigation.

The court fixed costs at $7,500 as a fair and reasonable amount.