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Reasons - May Be Inferred from the Record (2). Abbott v. London Health Sciences Centre
In Abbott v. London Health Sciences Centre (Ont CA, 2025) the Ontario Court of Appeal dismissed an appeal, this brought against a dismissed JR, which was in turn brought against the respondent board when they "without affording the appellants a hearing, decided to (i) cease providing OR time to the appellants and reassign that time to “clinical priority tertiary, quaternary-level surgical cases”, and (ii) cancel the hospital privileges of the appellants and revoke their staff appointments related to using OR time for their private practice patients", under s. 44 ['Ceasing to operate or provide services'] of the Public Hospitals Act.
The court considers the adequacy of reasons, here in a JR 'reasonableness review' context and from an administrative decision that did not provide "formal reasons" (adopting the reasons under it):[55] Finally, a reasonableness review focuses on the reasons of the administrative decision maker: Vavilov, at para. 84. In this case the Board gave no formal reasons; it adopted the recommendations of the Committee contained in the detailed Briefing Note the Committee provided to the Board. Although the Board did not expressly say that it was adopting the Briefing Note as its reasons, the Divisional Court appears to have approached the matter as though it did.
[56] The appellants did not argue that that approach was inappropriate here, and in the circumstances of this case I see no error in it. In conducting a reasonableness review, a reviewing court is directed to consider the institutional context in which the decision is made and the nature of the decision maker: Vavilov, at paras. 91-93. These factors make it sensible to view the Board as having adopted the recommendations of the Committee for the reasons expressed by the Committee in the Briefing Note. This conclusion is fortified by the fact that the December 22, 2023 letters, sent to the appellants informing them of the Board’s decision, outlined, albeit in abbreviated form, reasons for the Board’s decision consistent with the Briefing Note.
[57] As the Federal Court of Appeal noted in Givogue v. Canada (Attorney General), 2024 FCA 186, at para. 7, leave to appeal refused, [2025] S.C.C.A. No. 30: “[w]here, as here, the Commission adopts the recommendations of its Officer in the Report for Decision, its brief reasons may be supplemented by the reasons in the Report” (emphasis added); see also Tazehkand v. Bank of Canada, 2023 FCA 208, at para. 39. . Gerasimov v. Ratayev
In Gerasimov v. Ratayev (Ont CA, 2025) the Ontario Court of Appeal noted that an argument of 'inadequate reasons' may be met by referring to the record below, here in a case conference context:[3] One of the reasons for judicial decisions noted by the Supreme Court in R. v. Sheppard, 2002 SCC 26, [2002] 1 S.C.R. 869, at paras. 46 and 66, is to permit meaningful appellate review. If the trial reasons “do not explain the ‘what’ and the ‘why’, but the answers to those questions are clear in the record, there will be no error”: R. v. G.F., 2021 SCC 20, [2021] 1 S.C.R. 801, at para. 70. However, if the answers are not on the record, “cursory reasons may obscure potential legal errors and not permit an appellate court to follow the trial judge’s chain of reasoning”: G.F., at para. 75. This was the case here. The lack of intelligible reasons showing a chain of reasoning means that there is no basis on which this court can decide the appeal on the merits. There needs to be an evidentiary record.
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