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Disturbing Divisional Court Tenancy Case
This is a disturbing case from the courts on 13 April 2022. By all appearances the self-repped appellant was unfamiliar with the practice from the Browne v Dunne rule (UK, 1893) that you first have to 'put' your intended contradictions to a witness before you can call evidence to impeach them - that's why she couldn't have her evidence admitted. Instead the crucially important issue of whether her rental was governed by the RTA or not went against her (again), leaving her with the close-to-zero rights of a licensee or 'unauthorized occupant': Guillaume v. Barney Rivers Investments Ltd. (Div Ct, 2022).
Important Land Lease and Trailer Park CaseIn White v Upper Thames Conservation Authority (Ont CA, 2022) the court affirmed that when the Residential Tenancies Act (RTA) applied to a land lease (and necessarily a trailer park) tenancy that provisions that attempted to seasonally restrict occupancy were void under the non-waiver provisions of the Act.
Judge Gets Caustic About Excess Legislation[36] In Canada (National Revenue) v. McNally, 2015 FCA 248 at paragraph 5, the Federal Court of Appeal urged reviewing courts to prudently exercise their discretion to hear moot cases given that “the task of courts…is to pronounce on legal principles only to resolve a real dispute.” Judicial pronouncement of legal principles in the absence of a real dispute, the Court noted, “can smack of gratuitous law-making, something that is reserved exclusively to the legislative branch of government.” [SS: it's Stratas JA (who else?), quoted by McWatt A.C.J.S.C.J.] Chief Animal Welfare Inspector v. Timothy Jackson and the Animal Care Review Board (Div Ct, 2022)
Self-Representer Considering Appeal? Read this.
. Narwhal International Limited v. Teda International Realty Inc.
In Narwhal International Limited v. Teda International Realty Inc. (Ont CA, 2021) the Court of Appeal usefully summarizes the limitations of an appeal that are often misunderstood by self-representers:[14] Unfortunately, the appellant misunderstands the function of an appellate court. It is not this Court’s responsibility to conduct a second trial. In the absence of a palpable and overriding error in the application judge’s assessment of the evidence, an appellate court must accept the judge’s findings of fact. A palpable and overriding error is an “obvious error that is sufficiently significant to vitiate the challenged finding of fact”: Longo v. MacLaren Art Centre, 2014 ONCA 526, [2014] O.J. No. 3242, at para. 39. It has also been said that:A palpable error is one which is clear to the mind or plain to see, so obvious that it could be easily seen or known or readily or plainly seen. An overriding error is one which had a sufficiently decisive effect, such that it would justify intervention and review on appeal: 1632093 Ontario Inc. (Turn-Key Projects) v. York Condominium Corporation No. 74, 2020 ONCA 843, 328 A.C.W.S. (3d) 66, at para. 1.
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