In George v. Thach, Superior Court Justice Harvey Spiegel ruled that “The failure to possess a lawfully issued operator’s permit does not of itself constitute incompetence or inexperience.” Accordingly, the employer of an unlicensed driver was not vicariously liable for…
In Shuker v. Gagne, Mr. Justice Barry Matheson of the Ontario Superior Court refused to permit the plaintiffs to amend their statement of claim, to plead that a defendant who had already been sued in the capacity of owner of a…
In Morrow v. Symons, a young man was seriously injured while being towed on inline skates. He sued the driver of the car towing him, as well as three your men who were occupants of the car at the time….
In two decisions, released today, a five-member panel of the Court of Appeal has held that the Motor Vehicle Accident Claims Fund is, for limited purposes, an “insurer”. The cases are Allstate Insurance Company of Canada v. Motor Vehicle Accident…
FURTHER UPDATE–We understand that the appeal from this decision was heard by the Court of Appeal on October 31, 2007. We’ll report on the appeal decision as soon as it becomes available. UPDATED–Since the original post, some additional discussion of the…
In Royal & SunAlliance Insurance v. Wawanesa Mutual Insurance Company, Superior Court Justice Frank Newbould has ruled that a loss transfer claim by one Ontario insurer against another, arising out of a car accident that took place in Vermont, is…
In an interesting decision, Mr. Justice David Brown has ruled that a fleet policy issued by Royal & SunAlliance provided uninsured motorist coverage to an employee of Royal’s named insured. The employee had been injured while pouring gasoline into the…
In Daly v. ING Halifax Insurance Company, the Court of Appeal held that hourly rates for attendant care are set by the Statutory Accident Benefits Schedule and cannot be challenged. The Court accepted the insurer’s argument, that section 50(10) of…
Another successful Civil Litigation Update concluded at Chateau Montebello yesterday. The conference, now in its 26th year, was acclaimed by numerous visiting Superior Court and Court of Appeal judges as Ontario’s premiere continuing legal education program. We are proud…
Representing insurance companies is getting more hazardous all the time. In Succar v. Wawanesa Mutual Insurance Company, the plaintiff had sued Wawanesa for statutory accident benefits arising out of an MVA that occurred on January 1, 1994. Wawanesa had stopped…