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CRAWFORD: All Ontarians deserve robust consumer protection law

IBC: BC is in a “lose-lose situation” due to high auto insurance costs

The government is continuing its conversations with the people of Ontario by hosting consultations across the province that will inform the 2019 Budget. The pre-budget consultations provide individuals and organizations with a chance to tell the government directly about what matters most to them ahead of next year’s Budget.

Industry responds to Ontario’s auto insurance shakeup

Three’s Company or Three’s a Crowd? Recent Guidance from the Courts on Third-Party Funding of Litigation

Third-party funding of litigation is a relatively new phenomenon in Canada. Under this type of funding arrangement, a third-party lender agrees to advance funds to a litigant, subject to terms and conditions, usually in exchange for a certain percentage of any amount that is recovered through settlement or after a judgment. As courts have recognized, these types of arrangements have the potential to increase access to justice by providing litigants who o not have access to significant capital with access to important resources and tools that may facilitate their ability to fully advance the merits of their claims. 

How often are people scamming insurers with cheque fraud?

[1]               These two appeals were heard together.  The plaintiff, Ms. Abbott, was in two separate motor vehicle accidents.  She sued the defendants.  These actions were settled.  Part of that settlement required that the party and party costs be assessed by an Assessment Officer.  This was done by Assessment Officer A. Palmer.  She issued a Certificate of Assessment of Costs dated February 16, 2018.  Assessment Officer Palmer reduced the costs claimed by Ms. Abbott in these two actions from $220,067.75 to $66,350.42 and awarded costs of the assessment against the plaintiff.  Ms. Abbott appeals the Certificate of Assessment of Costs.

[2]                Ms. Abbott raises a number of grounds of appeal: (1) The Assessment Officer erred by failing to performing a line-by-line analysis of the plaintiff’s dockets and disbursements and applied arbitrary deductions to the Bill of Costs; (2) The Assessment Officer breached the plaintiff’s rights to natural justice and procedural fairness by failing to consider the plaintiff’s objections under Rule 58.10 and only considered the defendants’ objections; 3) The Assessment Officer erred in principle in her application of the principles of proportionality and access to justice; 4) The Assessment Officer erred by applying a partial indemnity discount to the disbursements; 5) The Assessment Officer erred by reducing the costs award contrary to s. 20.1 of the Solicitor’s Act because the plaintiff’s counsel was being compensated by a contingency agreement; and 6) The Assessment Officer erred by ordering the successful plaintiff to pay the defendants’ costs of the assessment.

[3]               I acknowledge that in the absence of an error in law, misapprehension of the evidence, palpable and overriding error on a factual matter, or an assessment so unreasonable that it amounts to an error in principle, an Assessment Officer’s decision is given great deference: Rabbani v. Niagara (Regional Municipality), 2012 ONCA 280 (CanLII) at para. 6. In this case, I find that no deference should be afforded as it is my view that the Assessment Officer denied the plaintiff a fair hearing by failing to provide her a fair opportunity to object to the Assessment Officer’s decision.

Courts set high bar for conviction on dangerous driving causing death