Timothy Minnema

Unmarried parents litigated custody, access, and child support regarding their child.

The applicant father sought joint custody and increased parenting time, while the respondent mother sought sole custody.

The court found the parties lacked the communication and cooperation required for joint custody and concluded that conflict between the parties created a risk of chronic decision‑making impasse.

Sole custody was therefore granted to the mother, with structured access for the father and a detailed parenting schedule.

The court also resolved child support issues under the Child Support Guidelines, imputing income to the father by disallowing unreasonable business deductions and ordering arrears of child support and proportionate contributions to childcare expenses.

Following settlement of a family law dispute involving custody, access, property, and support, the parties sought a determination of costs.

The court considered Rule 24 of the Family Law Rules and the general principle that costs typically follow success but may not be appropriate where litigation resolves by consent without adjudication.

The judge found that success between the parties was divided and that it was difficult to determine a clear winner from the settlement terms.

Allegations of unreasonable conduct could not be assessed due to lack of sworn evidence and disputed facts.

In the absence of compelling reasons, the court declined to award costs to either party.

The applicant mother brought a motion seeking supervised access for the father and findings of contempt for alleged breaches of interim orders relating to insurance, benefits, and payment of an assessment retainer.

The respondent father cross‑moved to enforce the existing access order and sought make‑up parenting time.

The court held that the parties’ highly conflictual access exchanges and the father’s conduct regarding the infant child’s feeding constituted a sufficient change in circumstances to justify a limited variation of the interim order.

The court ordered that parenting exchanges occur at a supervised exchange centre and required the father to follow the mother’s feeding directions for the infant.

The court dismissed all contempt allegations, finding the orders either not clearly breached or not enforceable by contempt.

A parenting dispute between unmarried parents concerning custody, access, and child support for two young children.

The applicant sought sole custody and primary residence, while the respondent sought joint custody with approximately equal parenting time.

Applying the best interests test under the Children’s Law Reform Act, the court found the applicant had historically taken the lead in managing the children’s educational and medical needs and demonstrated greater organizational capacity.

However, the court concluded that maximizing the children’s time with the respondent was beneficial and ordered expanded overnight access, including weekday overnights and extended weekend parenting time.

Child support arrears were fixed and the issue of ongoing support under s. 9 of the Child Support Guidelines was left for agreement or further submissions.

The respondent wife brought a motion for summary judgment seeking final orders for custody, supervised access, passport and travel restrictions, and various property and support remedies following separation.

The court found there was no genuine issue requiring a trial regarding custody and access, given the mother’s role as primary caregiver and the father’s criminal convictions for offences against the mother and his disengagement from the litigation and supervised access regime.

Custody was granted to the mother and related passport and travel orders were made.

However, the court declined to grant summary judgment regarding lump sum child and spousal support and property-related relief tied to the matrimonial home.

Triable issues remained concerning the value of the property, the mortgage interest of the added party father, and whether lump sum support was properly pleaded and supported by evidence.

Child protection trial concerning a one‑year‑old child apprehended at birth.

The child protection agency sought Crown wardship, alleging the child was in need of protection under s. 37(2) of the Child and Family Services Act due to risk of harm in the mother’s care.

Evidence included prior child protection proceedings, psychological and parenting capacity assessments, concerns regarding the mother’s cognitive limitations, inconsistent access, and instability in her proposed caregiving plan involving a new partner.

The court found the child to be in need of protection and concluded that less disruptive alternatives, including supervision orders, would not adequately protect the child.

Crown wardship was ordered and the mother failed to meet the statutory test for post‑wardship access.

Following competing interim family law motions, the court invited written submissions on costs where either party believed their offers to settle met the requirements of Rule 18 of the Family Court Rules.

The applicant sought full indemnity costs, arguing the outcome was as favourable or more favourable than his offers to settle.

The court held that the applicant’s offers were not severable and therefore had to be assessed as a whole.

Because the final orders were less favourable to the applicant on several key issues, including the matrimonial home, imputed income, child support set-off, and section 7 expense proportions, the applicant failed to meet the burden under Rule 18(15).

No costs were awarded.

In a child protection proceeding, the mother brought a motion seeking specified supervised access with her newborn child and two additional observed visits by a physician for the purpose of assessment.

The child had been apprehended at birth due to extensive historical concerns, including the permanent removal of five previous children and recent professional assessments indicating risk.

The court considered s. 51(5) of the Child and Family Services Act governing access orders and the principle that access must benefit the child.

The court held that the Society had exercised its discretionary authority over supervised access responsibly and that there was no demonstrated benefit to the child from the proposed observational visits.

The mother failed to establish a clear purpose, need, or expert qualification supporting the proposed assessment.

At a temporary care hearing under ss. 51(2) and (3) of the Child and Family Services Act, the child protection agency sought to place two children in the temporary care of a kin caregiver who had acted in a parental role.

The mother opposed the motion and sought the children’s return to her care under a supervision order.

The court found reasonable grounds to believe the children were at risk of harm due to the mother’s recent drug abuse, criminal involvement, and early stage of recovery.

The court also concluded that the proposed supervision arrangement would not adequately protect the children.

The agency’s motion to place the children with the kin caregiver was granted and the mother’s cross‑motion was dismissed.

The sole officer, director, and shareholder of a corporate plaintiff sought leave under Rule 51.01(2) of the Rules of Civil Procedure to represent the corporation after its solicitor was removed from the record.

The defendants opposed the request, arguing that the corporation’s financial ability to retain counsel and the proposed representative’s litigation capability should be considered.

The court reviewed conflicting authorities on whether a closely held corporation’s financial capacity to hire counsel is relevant.

Applying Lamond v. Smith, the court held that where the corporation is closely held and the moving party is the sole director and shareholder, the corporation’s financial position is not determinative.

Finding the moving party competent to articulate the corporation’s position and having authority to bind it, the court granted leave to represent the corporate plaintiff.

An application under the Interjurisdictional Support Orders Act, 2002 concerning child support for two children residing with the mother in another province.

The mother sought child support based on income imputed to the father after he voluntarily left military employment to pursue paramedic training.

The court held that the father was intentionally unemployed but found his return to school constituted reasonable educational advancement, declining to impute income during the training period.

Child support was therefore suspended during the schooling period but ordered to resume upon anticipated employment.

The court also determined child support arrears for late 2013 based on the father's line 150 income including severance payments and ordered payment of the father's proportionate share of section 7 childcare expenses.

On cross-motions for interim family law relief following separation, the court addressed parenting time, support, a custody and access assessment, and the disposition of the matrimonial home.

Applying the interim custody principle that the status quo should generally be maintained absent compelling evidence, the court found the father’s increased involvement with the children since separation supported an equal parenting arrangement and ordered a week‑on/week‑off schedule.

Interim child support was calculated on a high-income payor basis using a weighted average income of approximately $670,554 for the father and $15,000 for the mother, with set‑off child support and spousal support determined using the Spousal Support Advisory Guidelines.

The court also ordered the sale of the matrimonial home under the Partition Act to allow the mother access to her equity.

A custody and access assessment was directed.

The plaintiff brought a motion seeking to transfer a Small Claims Court action to the Superior Court of Justice in order to pursue substantially higher damages.

The action originally sought damages within the Small Claims Court monetary jurisdiction, but the plaintiff later asserted losses exceeding $400,000 arising from the repossession of a leased truck and resulting business losses and health consequences.

The court considered the principles governing transfers from Small Claims Court, including the court’s inherent jurisdiction to permit a transfer where appropriate.

Relying on authorities addressing when a plaintiff may pursue the claim in its “real dimensions,” the court held that the circumstances justified a transfer despite the plaintiff’s earlier choice of forum.

The motion was granted, but costs were awarded to the defendant because the need for the motion arose from the plaintiff’s own procedural error.

Following a three‑day family law trial, the applicant sought substantial indemnity costs of $5,560.11 relying on success at trial, alleged reasonableness, and a prior offer to settle.

The court held that success at trial had been divided and that both parties had behaved unreasonably in aspects of the litigation, including disclosure issues.

The purported offer to settle was found invalid under Rule 18 of the Family Law Rules because it lacked the party’s signature and contained vague, unenforceable terms regarding child support.

The court also found the offer would have been unreasonable in any event due to missing financial disclosure.

In the circumstances, the court declined to award costs to either party.

The applicant sought judicial review of a Workplace Safety and Insurance Appeals Tribunal decision that found she was an employee acting in the course of her employment when her parked vehicle was struck by a bus.

The Tribunal's decision barred her civil action against the bus company.

The respondent moved to dismiss the application for delay, which the court denied due to the applicant's medical and personal circumstances.

On the merits, the Divisional Court found the Tribunal's decision was reasonable and dismissed the application for judicial review, declining to award costs due to the applicant's impecuniosity.

Following earlier reasons enforcing minutes of settlement in family litigation concerning claims to a matrimonial home and alleged resulting trust, the court determined the parties’ entitlement to costs of multiple motions.

The applicant had been substantially successful on her motion to enforce the settlement and the respondent spouse’s conduct in refusing to comply with the settlement was found unreasonable, though not amounting to bad faith.

The added respondents (heirs of the registered owner of the property) sought substantial costs but were found not to have achieved clear success and their participation was closely aligned with the unsuccessful respondent spouse.

Considering Rule 24 of the Family Court Rules and fairness between the parties, the court declined to order costs against the applicant and instead ordered the respondents jointly and severally to pay the applicant’s motion costs.

Following the breakdown of a long marriage that began when the respondent was a teenager and the applicant was significantly older, the court addressed equalization of net family property, sale of the matrimonial home, and spousal support.

The respondent sought an unequal division of property, a constructive trust over a home purchased prior to marriage, exclusive possession of the home, and retroactive child and spousal support.

The court rejected the constructive trust claim and found no basis for an unequal division under s. 5(6) of the Family Law Act because the circumstances did not reach the high threshold of unconscionability.

The matrimonial home was ordered sold, equalization was calculated, and post‑separation financial adjustments were made.

Retroactive and ongoing compensatory spousal support was awarded, but the claim for retroactive adult‑child support was dismissed for lack of jurisdiction.

The responding parent brought a motion to change a prior consent order granting joint custody with primary residence to him and weekend access to the other parent.

He sought sole custody, while the other parent sought equal time and continuation of joint custody.

The court held that no material change in circumstances had been established with respect to custody under the Children’s Law Reform Act, and therefore declined to vary the joint custody order.

However, the court found a material change regarding access and concluded that the child’s best interests required a simpler and more balanced parenting schedule to reduce parental conflict.

Access was varied to an alternating week‑on/week‑off schedule with detailed parenting provisions and revised child support.

The moving party father brought a motion to change child support, section 7 expenses, private school tuition obligations, spousal support arrears enforcement, and access travel costs.

The court declined to impute income to the father, setting ongoing child support based on his actual reduced income.

The court ordered the father to pay his proportionate share of valid section 7 expenses (dental and tutoring) based on historical incomes, but dismissed claims for summer camps and other extracurriculars lacking consent or proof of necessity.

The father's requests to vary his 50% contribution to private school tuition, suspend enforcement of spousal support arrears due to bankruptcy, and share access travel costs were all dismissed.

The parties separated in 2006 and shared parenting of their 10-year-old child.

After the mother planned to relocate, the father obtained an interim without prejudice order for week-on/week-off shared custody and prohibiting the child's relocation.

The mother subsequently brought a motion to vary the interim order to implement the access recommendations of a newly released Office of the Children's Lawyer report, which recommended primary residence with the mother.

The court dismissed the motion, finding that the OCL report did not mandate immediate action and that maintaining the existing week-on/week-off arrangement provided stability and was in the child's best interests pending trial.