Court File and Parties

CITATION: The Law Society of Upper Canada v. Robson, 2014 ONSC 7254

DIVISIONAL COURT FILE NOs.: 557/14

DATE: 20141215

SUPERIOR COURT OF JUSTICE – ONTARIO

DIVISIONAL COURT

RE: THE LAW SOCIETY OF UPPER CANADA v. PAUL ROBSON

BEFORE: NORDHEIMER J.

COUNSEL: P. Robson in person/moving party L. Freeman for The Law Society of Upper Canada/ respondent

HEARD at Toronto: December 15, 2014

E N D O R S E M E N T

[1] Mr. Robson brings this motion to quash the Notice of Appeal filed by The Law Society of Upper Canada from the decision of the Law Society Tribunal Appeal Division dated October 28, 2014. At the conclusion of Mr. Robson’s submissions, I dismissed the motion with reasons to follow. I now provide those reasons.

[2] The order of the Law Society Tribunal Appeal Division allowed Mr. Robson’s appeal from a decision of the Law Society Tribunal and ordered that a new hearing was to be held before a differently constituted hearing panel. The reasons for the Appeal Division’s order have not as yet been received.

[3] The Law Society has appealed the decision of the Appeal Division. In its Notice of Appeal, the Law Society states the ground of the appeal as:

The Appeal Division erred in law in failing to show deference to the Hearing Division’s decision to prevent the Respondent from relitigating facts already found by Madam Justice Lax in Tessis Partners et al. v. Robson et al. Court File #31-262569.

[4] Mr. Robson advances two grounds for his motion to quash. One is that the ground of appeal is not set out with sufficient “definiteness” with reliance on Shoprite Stores v. Gardiner, [1935] S.C.R. 637. I do not agree. In my view, the ground of appeal in this case is set out with sufficient detail. It clearly states the error that the Law Society submits the Appeal Division made. In addition, the question in Shoprite did not involve the jurisdiction of the court to hear the appeal. Rather, it dealt with whether a party could advance a particular ground of appeal if the ground was not set out with sufficient “definiteness” in the Notice of Appeal.

[5] The other ground advanced by Mr. Robson is his position that the order of the Appeal Division is interlocutory, not final, and therefore no appeal from it lies to this court. I do not agree with that position either. First, the distinction between interlocutory orders and final orders does not apply comfortably to decisions of appellate bodies in the same fashion that it does when one is dealing with a court or tribunal of first instance. In any event, insofar as that demarcation can be applied, in my view, the order of the Appeal Division is a final order. It has finally disposed of the appeal and the issues raised therein. Mr. Robson is correct that, if the Appeal Division’s order is sustained, there will have to be a fresh hearing held. However, what Mr. Robson does not seem to appreciate is that, if the order of the Appeal Division is in error, the decision of the first Hearing Panel will presumably be restored and the matter will then be concluded. If that latter result occurs, then the matter is finally disposed of.

[6] An order does not have to determine each and every issue between the parties, or even the larger issue between the parties, to be a final order. As Morden A.C.J.O. noted in Buck Bros. Ltd. v. Frontenac Builders Ltd. (1994), 19 O.R. (3d) 97 (C.A.) at para. 8:

I have difficulty concluding that an order on an issue raised in a proceeding which ends the proceeding is interlocutory simply because it does not finally determine another, quite possibly larger, issue between the parties which may be subsequently determined in some other proceeding or by some other process.

In this case, the proceeding that is ended is the appeal.

[7] Further, as the respondent points out, if Mr. Robson’s position was correct, it would mean that in any case where an appellate court or appellate tribunal allowed an appeal, and ordered a fresh hearing, there would be no further right of appeal. As a review of any legal database would quickly demonstrate, there have been a myriad of such appeals, all of which have proceeded without any suggestion that no further appeal rights existed.

[8] It is for these reasons that Mr. Robson’s motion to quash the Notice of Appeal was dismissed.

NORDHEIMER J.

DATE: December 15, 2014