Mark Emil Walli

The defendants, The Dominion of Canada General Insurance Company and The Travelers Companies Inc., brought a motion to strike out portions of the plaintiff Municipal Electric Association Reciprocal Insurance Exchange's statement of claim.

The challenged claims included inducing breach of contract, breach of fiduciary duty, knowing assistance of breach of fiduciary duty, and civil conspiracy.

The court dismissed the motion, finding that the plaintiff had adequately pleaded material facts for each cause of action, meeting the stringent test for a Rule 21.01(1)(b) motion, which requires establishing that the claim has no reasonable prospect of success.

The defendants moved to dismiss a 2009 action for delay and, alternatively, for security for costs.

The court found the delay of 13 years to be inordinate and inexcusable, primarily due to the plaintiff Lawrence Mark Dale's inactivity and failure to provide explanations or respond to the motion.

A presumption of prejudice to the defendants arose, which the plaintiff failed to rebut, particularly given the nature of the conspiracy claims requiring witness recollection.

The action was dismissed for delay.

The court also addressed the security for costs motion, noting that if the action had not been dismissed, Mr. Dale would have been ordered to post $400,000 in security for costs to TRREB due to an outstanding costs order against him in another proceeding.

The appellants appealed the dismissal of their action against the estate of their first cousin, Dr. Sherman, and others.

The appellants claimed that Dr. Sherman owed them an ad hoc fiduciary duty to look after their financial interests and that he breached this duty by failing to honour an option agreement that would have allowed them to acquire shares in the family businesses.

The motion judge dismissed the action on two grounds: first, that no genuine issue requiring trial existed regarding the fiduciary duty, and second, that the action constituted an abuse of process as it attempted to re-litigate issues already determined in a prior unsuccessful action against Royal Trust.

The Court of Appeal upheld the dismissal.

An insured brought an action against international insurers for breach of an insurance contract.

The insurers moved to stay the action and refer the dispute to arbitration in London, England pursuant to an arbitration clause in the policy.

The motion judge dismissed the stay motion, finding that the "Action Against Insurer" endorsement provided an alternative method of dispute resolution allowing domestic court proceedings.

The appellate court reversed, holding that the arbitration clause was mandatory and the sole method of dispute resolution, and that the "Action Against Insurer" clause was a service of suit provision that did not conflict with the arbitration clause.

The court also clarified that the Model Law on International Commercial Arbitration applies to agreements providing for arbitration of certain disputes, not only those providing for arbitration as the sole method of dispute resolution.