Wednesday: What’s Hot on CanLII

Each Wednesday we tell you which three English-language cases and which French-language case have been the most viewed* on CanLII and we give you a small sense of what the cases are about.

For this last week:

1. Yetman v. Marzec, 2014 ONSC 4624

[9] The overarching answer to these three factors comes about by asking the question: Why did this trial, which generated the significant costs claimed, occur?

[10] The Defendant driver, Mr. Marzec, did not participate. The Statutory Third Party denies coverage to that driver, an issue that has not yet been determined. The Statutory Third Party’s total obligation, if denial is justified, under sections 258 and 251 of The Insurance Act would be $200,000. However there were two claimants for the this fund and the Statutory Third Party settled with the other one, Mr. Goodman for half, leaving only $100,000 for the Plaintiff to access. The Plaintiff settled his contest with Mr. Goodman for the above mentioned $25,000.

2. R. v. Javier, 2014 ONCJ 361

[9] The Court in Michael considered the case of an impecunious aboriginal offender who was being sentenced on nine relatively minor summary conviction offences. The cumulative amount of his victim surcharges would have been $900 if no fines had been imposed as part of his sentence. The Court found, however, that as it could choose to impose nominal fines in addition to jail or probation for Mr. Michael, the victim surcharge did not constitute cruel or unusual punishment in his particular circumstances. In other words, the judge found that it was open to him to impose a fine of as little as one dollar on each count, reducing the victim surcharge to virtually nothing. However, when the judge considered a hypothetical situation (as he was required to do under the s. 12 Charter analysis as set out in Nur) of an offender in a slightly different situation from Mr. Michael he found that a judge who was required to sentence an offender on multiple counts to both jail and probation would be prevented from imposing a fine and would therefore have to impose the statutory amount of $100 in victim surcharges for each offence, for a total of $900. The Court found that the imposition of $900 in victim surcharges would be cruel and unusual punishment and therefore declared s. 737 of the Code to be of no force or effect.

[10] The application judge in Michael did a thorough and detailed review of the law. I find, however, that I cannot agree with his conclusion that the mandatory victim surcharge in s. 737 is cruel and unusual punishment that is in breach of the Charter. I am of the view that there is sufficient flexibility available to a sentencing judge to avoid undue harshness in the application of this section.

3. Wyman v. Kadlec, 2014 ONSC 4710

[25] It is conceded that the plaintiff is not an employee. He argues that he was a dependent contractor and as such was entitled to notice of termination of between 6 – 9 months, which should be extended to 12 months given the circumstances of the termination.

[26] Around 2004, Mr. Wyman set up Northwest Resort Management, a sole proprietorship. He said that it was created so that he could deduct the costs for his truck as a business expense. Mr. Wyman would have been about 55 years old by then based on his age of 65 at the time of trial. The plaintiff managed Bush Lake from June of 2004 until September of 2008 when he was terminated by the defendants. He testified that he could have worked managing other resorts, though he never did.

[27] The Court of Appeal discussed the distinctions between employees, dependent and independent contractors in McKee v. Reid’s Heritage Homes Ltd., 2009 ONCA 916 (CanLII), 2009 ONCA 916. At para 22, the court held that case law has developed an intermediate category of dependent contractor, defined by economic dependency in the work relationship, which requires reasonable notice for termination. The need for notice has been held to arise out of a high level of exclusivity or complete exclusivity in the work: para. 25.

The most-consulted French-language decision was Corporation Makivik c. Québec (Procureure générale), 2014 QCCA 1455

[87] À mon avis, en l’espèce, le ministre a commis trois manquements au processus convenu. Deux sont d’ailleurs admis par le procureur général et le troisième n’est pas soulevé clairement pas les parties appelantes.

[88] D’abord, le 17 mars 2011, le ministre a annoncé une date d’ouverture de la chasse aux caribous de la rivière aux Feuilles choisie unilatéralement, sans en discuter au préalable avec le Comité conjoint. De plus, le ministre n’a même pas daigné informer les représentants des peuples autochtones des préoccupations reçues des pourvoiries entre son annonce du 25 février et celle du 17 mars, invoquées par lui pour modifier cette date. Finalement, la date annoncée fait fi d’une résolution antérieure du Comité conjoint, de surcroît adoptée par le vote de ses représentants. Bref, un revirement de la position ministérielle, le genre de situation où la Convention fait clairement obligation de consulter le Comité conjoint, puisque cela ne constituait pas une modification d’ordre mineur au sens de l’al. 24.4.37, tel que le démontrent les déclarations sous serment produites par les parties appelantes et comme l’a conclu la juge de première instance.

[89] On peut aisément retenir que les représentants autochtones au Comité conjoint, mis au fait des demandes des pourvoyeurs et de la nouvelle proposition du ministre, auraient tenté de faire valoir des arguments différents et même proposé une ou plusieurs autres solutions.

* As of January 2014 we measure the total amount of time spent on the pages rather than simply the number of hits; as well, a case once mentioned won’t appear again for three months.