R. Staley

The plaintiff condominium corporation appealed an Associate Justice's order striking several paragraphs from its Fresh as Amended Statement of Claim.

The underlying action alleged that the defendants conspired to cause the plaintiff to release easements over adjacent land for little or no value.

The Associate Justice struck paragraphs referring to the financial position of non-parties as irrelevant and scandalous, and struck other paragraphs for pleading evidence rather than material facts.

The Superior Court of Justice dismissed the appeal, finding no error in principle in the Associate Justice's exercise of discretion.

The plaintiff moved to add its founder back into the action as a plaintiff nunc pro tunc, arguing misnomer.

The founder had originally commenced the action in his own name but subsequently obtained an ex parte order substituting the corporate plaintiff for himself.

The court dismissed the motion, finding that the deliberate decision to substitute the parties meant the founder was not always the intended plaintiff, and thus the test for misnomer was not met.

However, the court granted leave to amend the statement of claim to add the founder as a plaintiff without prejudice to any limitation period defence, as agreed by the defendants.

The moving parties brought a motion to remove the responding parties' counsel of record due to an alleged conflict of interest.

The moving parties argued that the law firm had previously acted for a jointly owned corporation and possessed confidential information relevant to the current shareholder dispute, specifically regarding a project called AllianceCare.

The court found that the law firm had a prior solicitor-client relationship with the jointly owned corporation and that the new retainer was sufficiently related to the past work, raising a rebuttable presumption of prejudice.

Because the responding parties refused to answer questions about AllianceCare during cross-examination, the court drew an adverse inference and found the presumption was not rebutted.

The motion was granted and the law firm was removed as counsel of record.

In the context of CCAA proceedings for U.S. Steel Canada Inc. (USSC), the applicant sought approval for Transition Arrangements with its parent company, a Business Preservation Plan involving significant cash conservation measures (including suspension of pension, OPEB, and municipal tax payments), and Amended DIP Financing.

The court approved the motions, finding that the Transition Arrangements were fair and reasonable, and that the Business Preservation Plan and DIP financing were necessary to allow USSC to continue operations and pursue a restructuring solution, despite objections from the union and municipalities regarding the suspension of benefits and taxes.