Russel W. Zinn

The applicant sought judicial review of a decision refusing a positive Labour Market Impact Assessment (LMIA) for a food service supervisor position.

The officer concluded the applicant failed to demonstrate reasonable efforts to hire Canadians because advertising did not target underrepresented groups as required by ESDC guidelines.

The Federal Court held the officer unlawfully fettered her discretion by applying the non-binding Program Requirements as if they were mandatory law, without considering whether the cumulative recruitment efforts otherwise met the regulatory requirement.

The application for judicial review was allowed.

The applicant sought judicial review of a decision denying her application for permanent residence on humanitarian and compassionate grounds.

She arrived from Jamaica in 1991 and remained in Canada without authorization.

She argued the officer improperly dismissed her 30-year unauthorized work history, applied the wrong legal test by using the terms 'exceptional' and 'extraordinary', and failed to assess her personal hardship if returned to Jamaica.

The Federal Court dismissed the application, finding the officer reasonably weighed her establishment against her non-compliance, used the correct legal standard, and properly considered her personal circumstances and ability to re-establish herself in Jamaica.

Following the dismissal of the Defendant's motion to file reply expert evidence, the Plaintiffs sought a lump sum costs award of $7,500 payable forthwith.

The Court declined to award a lump sum because the Plaintiffs failed to provide a bill of costs or any evidence of actual costs incurred.

The Court also found it inappropriate to order costs payable forthwith as the original motion was not one that ought not to have been brought.

Costs were awarded to the Plaintiffs in any event of the cause to be taxed at the upper end of Column V of Tariff B.

The applicant applied for a travel document to return to Canada but was refused for failing to meet the residency requirement of 730 days in a five-year period.

The Immigration Appeal Division dismissed his appeal, finding that his reasons for an extended stay in Lebanon—initially to care for his father and later to work—did not outweigh the significant breach of his residency obligation, despite some economic hardship.

The Federal Court dismissed the application for judicial review, concluding that the IAD reasonably assessed the evidence and factors.

The applicant applied under s. 57(1) of the Trademarks Act to strike the respondent's trademark registration for 'NORSTEEL'.

The applicant claimed it had prior use of the trade name 'NORSTEEL BUILDING SYSTEMS' and that the respondent's mark was invalid because it lacked distinctiveness and the respondent was not the person entitled to secure the registration.

The Federal Court held the applicant had standing as a 'person interested' and rejected the respondent's defence of acquiescence.

The Court found the applicant established prior use and confusion, rendering the respondent's mark invalid under ss. 18(1)(b) and (d).

The application for expungement was granted.

The plaintiffs, the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration and the Minister of Public Safety, appealed a prothonotary's order requiring them to disclose privileged documents in a citizenship revocation proceeding.

The Court raised a preliminary issue of whether it had jurisdiction to hear the appeal.

The Court held that section 10.6 of the Citizenship Act, which bars appeals from interlocutory judgments in declarations referred to in subsection 10.1(1) or 10.5(1), applies to decisions of prothonotaries, removing the Court's jurisdiction.

The appeal was dismissed.

The applicant sought judicial review of a Transport Canada decision approving the respondent's application to place a private mooring buoy in Georgian Bay.

The applicant challenged the decision on grounds including lack of effective public notice, failure to consider the respondent's compliance record, reliance on inaccurate information, and internally incoherent reasoning regarding safety.

The Court found the applicant lacked personal standing but granted public interest standing.

On the merits, the Court found that Transport Canada reasonably concluded effective notice was given, appropriately considered the compliance record under the Act, did not rely on relevant inaccurate information, and provided coherent reasoning regarding navigational safety.

The application for judicial review was dismissed.

The applicant sought judicial review of a COVID-19 pandemic response bylaw enacted by the Fort William First Nation Chief and Council, arguing it was ultra vires.

The impugned bylaw was repealed before the application was filed.

Applying the Borowski test, the Federal Court dismissed the application for mootness and declined to exercise its discretion to hear it, noting that proceeding would lack practical utility and intrude into the legislative sphere of the band council.

The applicant sought judicial review of a final level response to a defamation grievance.

The certified tribunal record omitted the applicant's final submissions and attachments.

The respondent conceded the omission but argued the level of procedural fairness owed was minimal.

The Court held that even at the low end of the procedural fairness spectrum, the decision-maker must consider final submissions.

The application was allowed, the decision was set aside, and the matter was remitted to a different decision-maker.

Costs of $1,000 were awarded to the self-represented applicant.

The defendant moved to compel the plaintiffs to answer written examination questions concerning the historical financial, agricultural, and natural resource development on the Blood Reserve since 1882.

The plaintiffs had objected on grounds of relevance and proportionality.

The Federal Court found the requested information relevant to the damages assessment for breach of treaty land entitlement and proportional to the substantial claim.

The motion to compel was granted.

The defendants appealed an order of a prothonotary who, on a motion to strike the plaintiffs' action for undue delay under Rule 167, found undue delay but imposed case management rather than dismissing the action.

The prothonotary had also refused the defendants leave to file a reply affidavit detailing post-motion delays.

The Federal Court allowed the appeal, holding that the prothonotary erred in refusing the reply affidavit because it was relevant to the remedy.

Applying the culture shift mandated by Hryniak and Jordan, the Court found that once undue delay is established, an action should presumptively be dismissed unless the defaulting party establishes that an alternative sanction will result in reasonable prosecution.

Given the plaintiffs' continuing delays, failure to provide a litigation plan, and opposition to case management, the Court set aside the prothonotary's remedy and dismissed the action with costs.

The applicant sought a stay of his removal to Iran pending his application for leave and judicial review of a refusal to defer his removal.

The applicant produced new documentary evidence of risk in Iran based on his sexual orientation.

The Court found the officer's treatment of the new evidence was problematic and failed to properly assess the risk.

Applying the tripartite test, the Court found a serious issue, irreparable harm if removed without a proper risk assessment, and that the balance of convenience favored the applicant.

The motion for a stay of removal was granted.

The applicant, an inmate, had his PlayStation One memory card confiscated upon transfer to a medium-security institution on the basis that it was a restricted "removable or portable mass storage device" under a Commissioner's Directive.

He grieved the confiscation.

The grievance was denied at the final level.

On judicial review, the Federal Court held the decision was unreasonable.

The Court determined that the only reasonable interpretation of the Directive in context was that the prohibition referred solely to computer peripherals, not gaming system accessories.

The application was allowed and the respondent was ordered to return the memory card immediately.

The plaintiffs brought actions under the Patented Medicines (Notice of Compliance) Regulations to prevent the defendants from obtaining notices of compliance for generic versions of apixaban (ELIQUIS).

The defendants alleged the asserted claims of the 202 Patent (compound) and 171 Patent (formulation) were invalid on grounds including insufficiency, inutility, anticipation, obviousness, and double patenting.

The Federal Court found that the defendants failed to establish invalidity on any ground.

The 202 Patent was not anticipated or rendered obvious by a prior genus patent (the 330 Patent), and the 171 formulation patent possessed an inventive concept relating to particle size and dissolution rates.

The patents were held valid, and the plaintiffs' applications were granted.