Sunday Olusola Adeyemi

This is a costs endorsement following a focused trial on child support obligations.

The applicant (mother) sought full recovery costs, arguing she was the successful party and the respondent (father) had acted unreasonably by failing to provide timely financial disclosure and not making a settlement offer.

The court found the mother was the much more successful party, but her offer to settle did not meet the threshold for full recovery costs under Rule 18(14) of the Family Law Rules.

The father's conduct was deemed unreasonable, though not bad faith.

The court fixed the mother's costs at $3,600, inclusive of fees, disbursements, and HST, payable by the father in monthly installments.

The applicant mother sought retroactive child support from September 2017 and imputation of the respondent father's income, along with contributions to the child's piano expenses.

The father sought support from November 2020 based on a lower income and argued against the piano expenses.

The court found the mother gave effective notice for retroactive support in June 2017, setting the presumptive start date to September 2017.

The court imputed the father's income for various years, finding his self-reported income unreliable and his financial disclosure inadequate and blameworthy.

The court also found the piano expenses to be eligible extraordinary expenses.

Child support arrears were fixed, and a payment schedule was ordered.

The applicants, a family from Nigeria, sought judicial review of a Refugee Appeal Division (RAD) decision confirming they were not Convention refugees or persons in need of protection.

The RAD found they had a viable internal flight alternative (IFA) in Abuja.

The applicants argued they would be found and persecuted there by the female applicant's father.

The Federal Court held the RAD's decision was reasonable, finding the applicants had not established the father had the reach or influence to persecute them in Abuja and that relocating there was not unduly harsh.

The application for judicial review was dismissed.

The applicant filed a human rights application alleging that the respondent municipality discriminated against her on the basis of age through the actions of its by-law officers.

The Tribunal held a summary hearing to determine if the application was timely and had a reasonable prospect of success.

The Tribunal found that the last alleged incident of discrimination occurred more than a year before the application was filed, and the applicant failed to establish a series of incidents or a good faith reason for the delay.

Furthermore, the Tribunal concluded the application had no reasonable prospect of success because the applicant provided only bald assertions and no evidence linking the by-law enforcement actions to her age.

The application was dismissed.