Date: 2004-10-12 Parallel citations: 72 O.R. (3d) 669. Nordheimer J. | Link

The plaintiffs bring this motion to strike out certain paragraphs of the statements of defence of each of the defendants and to strike out certain paragraphs of the counterclaims advanced. At para [7] the Court states, "(t)he plaintiffs' claim in para. 1(f) is for damages "including but not limited to" loss of incremental revenue and goodwill. They expand on this claim in para. 40 to say that they have suffered "substantial loss including" incremental revenue and goodwill. The plaintiffs' claim is essentially an open-ended claim for damages of which incremental revenue and goodwill are components. It is, therefore, open to the defendants to plead, in response to this broad claim for damages, facts which would establish that some or all of the plaintiffs' damages were not caused by their conduct." The Court goes on to say at para [11] "In order for the trial judge to be able to determine the appropriate amount to be awarded that would put the plaintiffs in the same position they would have been in if no wrong had been committed may require the court to engage in a fairly broad review of the plaintiffs financial state. The plaintiffs cannot, at this early stage of the proceeding, circumscribe the nature of that inquiry. They certainly cannot deprive the defendants of information that the defendants may need in order to demonstrate that harm that the plaintiffs say they have incurred was not in fact the result of any actions of the defendants but arose from extraneous events."