Legal Blog

Costs

Occasionally, a case just jumps out at us. Prosperine v. Ottawa-Carleton, a 2004 decision of the Ontario Superior Court of Justice, was such a case.

It was a decision fixing costs on a motion. The defendants had successfully opposed the request of the plaintiffs to amend their statement of claim. Since the threshold for an amendment is very low, we presume that the parties fought the battle over whether the amendment disclosed a cause of action.

The defendants were asking for substantial indemnity costs of $121,000. We hear you gasp. Their solicitors stated that they had spent 401 hours on the motion; their clerk had spent an additional 38 hours. The plaintiffs’ solicitors thought that this was a trifle high and noted that they had only spent 74 hours.

The judge noted that there was no reason for substantial indemnity costs and fixed the costs on a partial indemnity basis. The judge stated that there must be some practical and reasonable limits on the amount awarded for costs and held that the time that the defendants’ solicitors spent was excessive.

 The judge awarded $30,000 plus GST, still a steep amount for a motion.