Articles 2025

Practitioners must remain attentive to their disclosure obligations. Any settlement agreement (or partial settlement agreement) reached between some parties, but not others, that entirely changes the landscape of the litigation in a way that significantly alters the dynamics of the litigation must be disclosed to the non-settling parties. The obligation to disclose is immediate and unequivocal.

The key takeaways from the Westport decision are that sureties will be entitled to assert priority against a wide range of funds, including those awarded in construction adjudications, as long as their indemnity agreements are drafted broadly. While ensuring the flow of funds through adjudication is important, a competing and equally important consideration is not disturbing the construction bonding regime.

This article presents an overview of the powers and duties of municipalities under the Building Code Act and the Ontario Building Code, provides examples of where municipalities can be vulnerable to liability, and discusses the view of the Canadian Courts on municipal liability.

An overview of the ways in which environmental, social and governance standards positively affect owners, builders, end-users, and society as a whole.

Ontario is now a little over four years into the new prompt payment requirements under the Construction Act, R.S.O. 1990, c. C.30. While there have been many articles on the written requirements set out in the new Part I.1 of the Act, not much is set in stone as far as the implementation and enforcement of these new provisions. More particularly, some members of the construction industry are finding it hard to understand and follow the requirements pertaining to Notices of Non-Payment.

Once lien rights are extinguished, they are extinguished forever. After a lien is first registered on title, does a withdrawal of the Claim for Lien instrument forever extinguish those lien rights? In Gay Company Limited v. 962332 Ontario Inc., 2023 ONSC 6023, survival of the claimant’s lien rights turned on this question.

On November 10, 2023, the Supreme Court of Canada rendered its much-anticipated decision in the matter of R. v. Greater Sudbury (City). The decision is noteworthy in its expanding, in a significant way, the health and safety obligations of an “owner” of a construction project under Ontario’s Occupational Health and Safety Act, R.S.O., 1990, c. O.1.