Library:

• Aviation
• Defamation & Media
• Dispute Resolution & Litigation
• Health & Administrative Law
• Insurance
• Marine
• Professional Liability & Indemnity

Leave to Intervene in Enforcement Proceedings Refused

Published in the May 2006 issue of Litigation Notes - View Article

Return to Main Menu ››

The Ontario Court of Appeal recently dismissed a motion to intervene brought by the Lawyers Rights Watch Canada (“LRWC”), an organization of Canadian lawyers who promote human rights issues and among other things, provide international support to human rights defenders. The issue under appeal is whether the Canadian Courts should recognize a civil judgment rendered by the Singapore courts. The basis of LRWC’s argument was that the legal system in Singapore is corrupt and therefore the Canadian courts should refuse to enforce judgments rendered from such a system.

The appellant Enernorth Industries Inc. (“Enernorth”), a Canadian company, entered into a commercial agreement with Oakwell Engineering Ltd. (“Oakwell”), a Singapore company, to build mobile power stations in India. The parties encountered various difficulties in completing the project. As a result, Enernorth purchased the interests held by Oakwell in this project but agreed to pay future royalties to Oakwell once the project was complete. Both parties agreed that the Singapore courts would retain jurisdiction to govern any future disputes that may arise as a result of this agreement. Enernorth ran into further difficulties with the project and ultimately sold its interests to an Indian company. Oakwell sued for the royalty payments or sums in lieu thereof. Enernorth took the position that the acts of the Indian government had frustrated the settlement agreement. The matter went to trial and a decision was rendered in favour of Oakwell.

Oakwell sought to enforce the judgment in Ontario. The application was heard before Justice Day of the Superior Court of Ontario. Essentially, Enernorth took the position that the foreign judgment should not be enforced in Ontario because the Singapore courts are ‘systemically corrupt’, and that ‘commercial disputes were inevitably determined in favour of those who were connected to the ruling oligarchy’. Among other things, Oakwell argued against any such impropriety in the determination of this matter in Singapore. Justice Day found no evidence to support any suggestion of corruption on the part of the trial judge.

The significance of this judgment is that LRWC did not meet the test for intervention. Justice McMurtry cited Ontario case law to make the point that leave to intervene can be granted where the intervenor can make a ‘useful contribution without causing any injustice to the immediate parties’. Although it is not necessary to prove that the intervenor be impartial or objective, it is necessary that the contribution be useful to the court in analysing the issues, rather than just repeating the evidence of another party or providing a slightly different emphasis (as in the case of LRWC). It was also noted that Ontario courts are more reluctant to grant intervenor status in cases where the underlying litigation is fundamentally private in nature.