Articles 2023

On November 10, 2023, the Supreme Court of Canada issued a split decision in R v. Greater Sudbury (City). This precedent-setting decision significantly expands the health and safety obligations of an “Owner” under Ontario’s Occupational Health and Safety Act.

Ontario’s prompt payment system under the Construction Act has changed the way that parties to construction projects understand their payment obligations. But there are several significant gaps in the prompt payment scheme that produce significant uncertainty and risk for contractors. In this article, we discuss three such gaps.

With the introduction of prompt payment and adjudication into Ontario’s Construction Act, the pursuit of “rough justice” became a new tool in the tool-kit of project participants. In spite of its procedural and other frailties, adjudication arrived along with a legislated provision that “the determination and reasons of an adjudicator are admissible as evidence in a court.” The addition of this “admissibility” provision raises interesting questions.

In Praxy Cladding Corp. v. Stone Lamina Inc., the Ontario Superior Court reviewed the process for amending pleadings in proceedings under the Construction Act, and in doing so, provided important clarity as to what constitutes an admission, as well as the distinction between an admission from a pleading versus an admission arising out of an examination for discovery. The authors consider the key takeaways from this decision with respect to pleadings and conducting examinations for discovery.

The recent article about the Ontario court decision of Premform v Heights Rental, highlights lessons learned when making decisions to exclude certain documents during the discovery process. The failure to comply with discovery obligations may land your client in a predicament before trial, needing the court's permission to rely on the late produced document, and cost consequences.

Can the construction lien and adjudication regimes co-exist in Ontario and work seamlessly, in harmony together? This article explores certain unintended pitfalls, shortcomings, and incongruencies associated with combining the regimes, as illustrated in the wording of the statute itself as well as in recent case law on adjudication.