Peter Pai Tak Chang

The moving defendants sought leave under Rule 26.01 of the Rules of Civil Procedure to amend their joint statement of defence, counterclaim, crossclaim, and third party claim by delivering separate pleadings and adding additional allegations and claims.

The court reaffirmed that leave to amend should generally be granted unless non-compensable prejudice would result, but scrutinized the proposed amendments for improper pleadings, including arguments, evidence, irrelevant matters, and procedural history that should instead be addressed through motions.

Numerous proposed paragraphs were rejected for pleading evidence, lacking particularity, or raising issues relating to pre-trial disclosure.

Leave was granted in part for both moving parties to amend their pleadings and third party claims, subject to extensive limitations and corrections.

Costs of $3,000 were awarded to one set of responding defendants for part of the motion.

The appellant appealed a Small Claims Court judgment awarding it $536.55 plus costs in a dispute over returned fabric.

The appellant alleged the trial judge made seven errors, including failing to address fraudulent misrepresentation, miscalculating the amount of fabric returned, and denying interpreter fees.

The Divisional Court dismissed the appeal, finding no errors of law or palpable and overriding errors of fact, noting the trial judge was in the best position to assess credibility and the evidence.

The respondents moved for security for costs of an appeal from a Small Claims Court decision, arguing the appeal was frivolous and the corporate appellant lacked assets in Ontario.

The Divisional Court dismissed the motion, finding the appeal was not devoid of merit given previous findings regarding the respondent's credibility.

Furthermore, the respondents failed to provide a breakdown of projected costs or evidence that the appellant lacked assets of any kind to cover costs.

The appellants appealed an order of the Superior Court of Justice.

The Court of Appeal dismissed the appeal, finding no merit in it.

The Court noted that it was obvious on the face of the prior order of Lang J. that it bound only the parties to that litigation.

Costs were awarded to the respondents.