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Federal Court - Joinder. Moreau v. Canada (House of Commons)
In Moreau v. Canada (House of Commons) (Fed CA, 2025) the Federal Court of Appeal dismissed an individual's consolidated appeal, here brought against two Federal Court standing/joinder orders regarding an incident where "the simultaneous interpretation of the proceedings of the House of Commons was interrupted, which the Speaker of the House of Commons commented on, only in English".
Here the court considered Federal Court joinder law [under FCR 303 (naming respondents)]:[5] On October 22, 2024, the Speaker of the Senate asked the appellant to amend his notice of application to remove her as a respondent because she is not at all affected by the application for remedy or involved in the allegations. After the appellant refused to comply with this request, the Speaker of the Senate brought a motion before the Federal Court on November 8, 2024, under Rules 104 and 303, seeking to be removed as a party and to have the style of cause amended. His Majesty the King did the same thing on November 5, 2024.
[6] In an order issued on November 27, 2024, Justice Lafrenière of the Federal Court allowed the Speaker of the Senate’s motion. On December 11, 2024, Justice Gascon of that same court also allowed His Majesty the King’s motion. In both cases, the Federal Court noted that neither the alleged shortcomings or facts, nor the remedies sought concern His Majesty the King or the Speaker of the Senate. In addition, the Federal Court found that no Act of Parliament provides for naming His Majesty the King or the Speaker of the Senate as a respondent in this dispute.
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[9] The Federal Court’s decisions on the joinder of parties, in application of Rule 104, are discretionary: Stevens v. Canada (Commissioner, Commission of Inquiry) (C.A.), 1998 CanLII 9074 (FCA), [1998] 4 F.C. 125 at para. 10. Insofar as such decisions involve the application of legal rules to facts, they may therefore be set aside only if the appellant can show that a palpable and overriding error was made. In contrast, errors that involve an extricable question of law must be reviewed on a standard of correctness: Housen v. Nikolaisen, 2002 SCC 33; Hospira Healthcare Corporation v. Kennedy Institute of Rheumatology, 2016 FCA 215; Seismotech IP Holdings Inc. v. Ecobee Technologies ULC, 2024 FCA 144 at para. 5; Mahjoub v. Canada (Citizenship and Immigration), 2017 FCA 157 at paras. 72 and 74.
[10] Rule 303(1) is clear: an application must name as a respondent every party directly affected by the remedies sought and, if applicable, the parties required to be included under an Act. When a person is not a proper party, nor a necessary party given the allegations made and remedies sought, they may cease to be a party under Rule 104(1): Canada (Fisheries and Oceans) v. Shubenacadie Indian Band, 2002 FCA 509 at paras. 6–8.
[11] In that case, this Court specified that a person should not be named as a defendant if the originating document "“states no cause of action against them, seeks no relief against them, and makes no allegations against them”" (at para. 6). The mere fact that the person may adduce relevant evidence or may be adversely affected by the outcome of the litigation will not be sufficient to join that person as a defendant in the litigation: ibid. at para. 7.
[12] That is precisely what Justice Lafrenière and Justice Gascon found in the two decisions that are the subject of these appeals. In both cases, the Federal Court concluded that His Majesty the King and the Speaker of the Senate were [translation] "“in no way involved in the application”" and that [translation] "“neither the alleged shortcomings and facts nor the remedies sought”" concerned His Majesty the King, the Senate or the Speaker.
[13] In my view, this finding is unassailable and contains no error of law, of fact or of application of the law to the facts. Indeed, the application relates only to allegations of non‑compliance with the OLA stemming from the interruption of simultaneous translation services on June 10, 2024, during a House of Commons debate. Yet, neither His Majesty the King nor the Speaker of the Senate plays a role in the conduct of House of Commons proceedings, nor in the way in which the simultaneous interpretation of those proceedings is provided. The House of Commons was present in this matter and clearly has better knowledge of the facts in dispute. Furthermore, none of the remedies sought involves His Majesty the King or the Speaker of the Senate. The fact that the appellant, in his originating document, claimed that there had been violations of the Charter does not in any way change the scope of the dispute or the nature of the remedies sought.
[14] The appellant contended that the Federal Court should have considered his motion for a mandatory interlocutory injunction. In that motion, the appellant asked the Federal Court to compel the Crown to exercise its prerogative to prorogue Parliament until the respondents took reasonable steps to protect interpreters from the violation of their rights. In his opinion, such an injunction would affect the Senate. However, it is accepted that the need for a party to be present for a proceeding must be assessed only on the basis of the contents of the originating document for that proceeding.
[15] Moreover, the Federal Court has already ruled that a third party may be joined as a party solely for the purposes of a motion, if it is established that their presence is necessary to dispose of the motion: see Canadian National Railway Company v. BNSF Railway Company, 2019 FC 142 at para. 14. More recently, the Speaker of the Senate was granted intervener status as part of a motion on the admissibility of documents relating to Senate proceedings. However, she was granted intervener status solely for the purposes of the motion; she was not considered a party to the underlying dispute, which was a class proceeding on a completely different issue: Thompson v. Canada, 2024 FC 1414; Thompson v. Canada, 2024 FC 1752; Thompson v. Canada, 2025 FC 476.
[16] Both Federal Court judges also correctly found that no Act of Parliament provides for naming the Speaker as a respondent in this proceeding. Even assuming that the OLA or the Rules allow the Speaker to be named as a party, doing so would not be appropriate insofar as this application involves only the House of Commons.
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[22] Regarding His Majesty the King, the appellant asserts that the Attorney General of Canada has already been named as a respondent, along with the House of Commons, in two prior cases: Quigley v. Canada (House of Commons) (T.D.), 2002 FCT 645 (CanLII), [2003] 1 F.C. 132 and Knopf v. Canada (House of Commons), 2006 FC 808. In my opinion, the fact that the Attorney General of Canada chose to participate as a respondent in a particular proceeding is insufficient to conclude that, in so doing, they agreed to being joined as a party in any subsequent dispute. The doctrine of issue estoppel does not extend that far.
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