{"id":5021,"date":"2014-04-07T04:00:00","date_gmt":"2014-04-07T08:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/summary-judgment-and-small-claims-court\/"},"modified":"2024-10-29T17:03:51","modified_gmt":"2024-10-29T21:03:51","slug":"summary-judgment-and-small-claims-court","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/en\/insights\/commercial-litigation\/summary-judgment-and-small-claims-court\/","title":{"rendered":"Summary Judgment and Small Claims Court"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The stated purpose of the Small Claims Court is to provide a streamlined process for parties to pursue claims of up to $25,000 in a cost-effective and efficient manner. In Superior Court, one of the options available to try and advance straightforward claims in a similar fashion is with a summary judgment motion as opposed to a full trial. However, while the\u00a0<em>Rules of Civil Procedure<\/em> provide specifically for the ins and outs of a summary judgment motion, the\u00a0<em>Rules of the Small Claims Court<\/em>\u00a0do not. The question becomes: can you move for summary judgment in small claims?<\/p>\n<p>In 2010, the Ontario Court of Appeal said &#8220;no&#8221;, with a caveat.<\/p>\n<p>It appeared that the Court of Appeal had answered this question\u00a0 in the negative in the 2010 decision <i><a href=\"http:\/\/canlii.ca\/t\/28z6b\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Van de Vrande v. Butkowsky<\/a>.<\/i>\u00a0 The Court determined that the lack of a specific rule for summary judgment in the Small Claims Court was a deliberate omission and could not be read into the rules by the Court.<\/p>\n<p>However, These motions are distinct from motions to strike under Rule 12.02 of the <i>Rules of the Small Claims Court<\/i>, where the Court may (among other things) strike or amend any document that discloses no reasonable cause of action or defence. These motions may serve similar functions as summary judgment motions, and Justice Rouleau noted in <i>Van de Vrande\u00a0<\/i>that the threshold for these types of motions under Rule 12.02 is deliberately lower than that of a summary judgment motion.<\/p>\n<p>With the recent Supreme Court of Canada decision of <a href=\"http:\/\/canlii.ca\/t\/g2s18\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"><i>Hryniak v. Mauldin<\/i><\/a> clarifying the rules and practice of summary judgment motions generally, there was some question as to whether this would impact the practice in Small Claims Court. There appear to be conflicting decisions that have recently been released on this point. I will focus on two specific ones.<\/p>\n<p>The first of these is <a href=\"http:\/\/canlii.ca\/t\/g3534\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"><i>Petersen v. Matt<\/i><\/a>. A Small Claims Court deputy judge summarily dismissed the plaintiff\u2019s claims, and the plaintiffs appealed to the Divisional Court.\u00a0 Mr. Justice Leroy for the Divisional Court applied the principles of <i>Hryniak<\/i> in determining when the Court may grant summary judgment, without any reference to Rule 12.02 of the <i>Rules of the Small Claims Court<\/i> or to the Court of Appeal decision in <i>Van de Vrande<\/i>.<\/p>\n<p>The second relevant decision is <a href=\"http:\/\/canlii.ca\/t\/g42pq\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"><i>Tuka v. Butt<\/i><\/a>, which was heard the day after <i>Petersen<\/i> was released. Deputy Judge Winny in <i>Tuka<\/i> openly questions whether Justice Leroy was aware of <i>Van de Vrande<\/i> and notes that summary judgment presumably would not have granted in <i>Petersen<\/i> or upheld on appeal had the judges in question been aware of <i>Van de Vrande<\/i>. Winny goes so far as to state that \u201cin my respectful opinion, <i>Petersen v. Matt\u2026<\/i>does not stand for the proposition that <i>Van de Vrande v. Butkowsky<\/i> is no longer good law\u201d.<\/p>\n<p>It remains to be seen whether the Divisional Court or, perhaps more properly, the Court of Appeal will comment on whether <i>Hryniak<\/i> impacts the earlier decision of <i>Van de Vrande<\/i> in assessing what the test is on a Rule 12.02 motion in Small Claims Court.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The stated purpose of the Small Claims Court is to provide a streamlined process for parties to pursue claims of up to $25,000 in a cost-effective and efficient manner. In Superior Court, one of the options available to try and advance straightforward claims in a similar fashion is with a summary judgment motion as opposed [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":14399,"parent":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[545],"insight-format":[418],"class_list":["post-5021","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-commercial-litigation"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v26.1.1 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Summary Judgment and Small Claims Court | Miller Thomson<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/en\/insights\/commercial-litigation\/summary-judgment-and-small-claims-court\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Summary Judgment and Small Claims Court | Miller Thomson\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"The stated purpose of the Small Claims Court is to provide a streamlined process for parties to pursue claims of up to $25,000 in a cost-effective and efficient manner. In Superior Court, one of the options available to try and advance straightforward claims in a similar fashion is with a summary judgment motion as opposed [&hellip;]\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/en\/insights\/commercial-litigation\/summary-judgment-and-small-claims-court\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Miller Thomson\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/MillerThomsonLaw\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2014-04-07T08:00:00+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2024-10-29T21:03:51+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/10\/Insigths_Commercial-Litigation_Post-Image.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"1776\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"994\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Katherine Chan\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@millerthomson\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@millerthomson\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Katherine Chan\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"3 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/en\/insights\/commercial-litigation\/summary-judgment-and-small-claims-court\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/en\/insights\/commercial-litigation\/summary-judgment-and-small-claims-court\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Katherine Chan\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/en\/#\/schema\/person\/5473b50a564d1e37f327fdd79cb348f6\"},\"headline\":\"Summary Judgment and Small Claims Court\",\"datePublished\":\"2014-04-07T08:00:00+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2024-10-29T21:03:51+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/en\/insights\/commercial-litigation\/summary-judgment-and-small-claims-court\/\"},\"wordCount\":516,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/en\/#organization\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/en\/insights\/commercial-litigation\/summary-judgment-and-small-claims-court\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/10\/Insigths_Commercial-Litigation_Post-Image.jpg\",\"articleSection\":[\"Commercial Litigation\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":[\"WebPage\",\"ItemPage\"],\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/en\/insights\/commercial-litigation\/summary-judgment-and-small-claims-court\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/en\/insights\/commercial-litigation\/summary-judgment-and-small-claims-court\/\",\"name\":\"Summary Judgment and Small Claims Court | Miller Thomson\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/en\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/en\/insights\/commercial-litigation\/summary-judgment-and-small-claims-court\/#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/en\/insights\/commercial-litigation\/summary-judgment-and-small-claims-court\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/10\/Insigths_Commercial-Litigation_Post-Image.jpg\",\"datePublished\":\"2014-04-07T08:00:00+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2024-10-29T21:03:51+00:00\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/en\/insights\/commercial-litigation\/summary-judgment-and-small-claims-court\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/en\/insights\/commercial-litigation\/summary-judgment-and-small-claims-court\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/en\/insights\/commercial-litigation\/summary-judgment-and-small-claims-court\/#primaryimage\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/10\/Insigths_Commercial-Litigation_Post-Image.jpg\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/10\/Insigths_Commercial-Litigation_Post-Image.jpg\",\"width\":1776,\"height\":994},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/en\/insights\/commercial-litigation\/summary-judgment-and-small-claims-court\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/en\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"Summary Judgment and Small Claims Court\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/en\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/en\/\",\"name\":\"Miller Thomson\",\"description\":\"National law firm providing business law expertise and litigation and disputes services for businesses across Canada since 1957.\",\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/en\/#organization\"},\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/en\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":{\"@type\":\"PropertyValueSpecification\",\"valueRequired\":true,\"valueName\":\"search_term_string\"}}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Organization\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/en\/#organization\",\"name\":\"Miller Thomson\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/en\/\",\"logo\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/en\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/10\/miller-thomson.svg\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/10\/miller-thomson.svg\",\"width\":380,\"height\":50,\"caption\":\"Miller Thomson\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/en\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/\"},\"sameAs\":[\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/MillerThomsonLaw\/\",\"https:\/\/x.com\/millerthomson\",\"https:\/\/www.linkedin.com\/company\/miller-thomson-llp\/\",\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/@millerthomson\"]},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/en\/#\/schema\/person\/5473b50a564d1e37f327fdd79cb348f6\",\"name\":\"Katherine Chan\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/en\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/da8a18c240b27905220d948a87957ba19ab6de326b44a2ce3072235c121f996f?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/da8a18c240b27905220d948a87957ba19ab6de326b44a2ce3072235c121f996f?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"caption\":\"Katherine Chan\"}}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Summary Judgment and Small Claims Court | Miller Thomson","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/en\/insights\/commercial-litigation\/summary-judgment-and-small-claims-court\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Summary Judgment and Small Claims Court | Miller Thomson","og_description":"The stated purpose of the Small Claims Court is to provide a streamlined process for parties to pursue claims of up to $25,000 in a cost-effective and efficient manner. In Superior Court, one of the options available to try and advance straightforward claims in a similar fashion is with a summary judgment motion as opposed [&hellip;]","og_url":"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/en\/insights\/commercial-litigation\/summary-judgment-and-small-claims-court\/","og_site_name":"Miller Thomson","article_publisher":"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/MillerThomsonLaw\/","article_published_time":"2014-04-07T08:00:00+00:00","article_modified_time":"2024-10-29T21:03:51+00:00","og_image":[{"width":1776,"height":994,"url":"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/10\/Insigths_Commercial-Litigation_Post-Image.jpg","type":"image\/jpeg"}],"author":"Katherine Chan","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_creator":"@millerthomson","twitter_site":"@millerthomson","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Katherine Chan","Est. reading time":"3 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Article","@id":"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/en\/insights\/commercial-litigation\/summary-judgment-and-small-claims-court\/#article","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/en\/insights\/commercial-litigation\/summary-judgment-and-small-claims-court\/"},"author":{"name":"Katherine Chan","@id":"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/en\/#\/schema\/person\/5473b50a564d1e37f327fdd79cb348f6"},"headline":"Summary Judgment and Small Claims Court","datePublished":"2014-04-07T08:00:00+00:00","dateModified":"2024-10-29T21:03:51+00:00","mainEntityOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/en\/insights\/commercial-litigation\/summary-judgment-and-small-claims-court\/"},"wordCount":516,"publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/en\/#organization"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/en\/insights\/commercial-litigation\/summary-judgment-and-small-claims-court\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/10\/Insigths_Commercial-Litigation_Post-Image.jpg","articleSection":["Commercial Litigation"],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":["WebPage","ItemPage"],"@id":"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/en\/insights\/commercial-litigation\/summary-judgment-and-small-claims-court\/","url":"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/en\/insights\/commercial-litigation\/summary-judgment-and-small-claims-court\/","name":"Summary Judgment and Small Claims Court | Miller Thomson","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/en\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/en\/insights\/commercial-litigation\/summary-judgment-and-small-claims-court\/#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/en\/insights\/commercial-litigation\/summary-judgment-and-small-claims-court\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/10\/Insigths_Commercial-Litigation_Post-Image.jpg","datePublished":"2014-04-07T08:00:00+00:00","dateModified":"2024-10-29T21:03:51+00:00","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/en\/insights\/commercial-litigation\/summary-judgment-and-small-claims-court\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/en\/insights\/commercial-litigation\/summary-judgment-and-small-claims-court\/"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/en\/insights\/commercial-litigation\/summary-judgment-and-small-claims-court\/#primaryimage","url":"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/10\/Insigths_Commercial-Litigation_Post-Image.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/10\/Insigths_Commercial-Litigation_Post-Image.jpg","width":1776,"height":994},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/en\/insights\/commercial-litigation\/summary-judgment-and-small-claims-court\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/en\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Summary Judgment and Small Claims Court"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/en\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/en\/","name":"Miller Thomson","description":"National law firm providing business law expertise and litigation and disputes services for businesses across Canada since 1957.","publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/en\/#organization"},"potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/en\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/en\/#organization","name":"Miller Thomson","url":"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/en\/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/en\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/10\/miller-thomson.svg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/10\/miller-thomson.svg","width":380,"height":50,"caption":"Miller Thomson"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/en\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/"},"sameAs":["https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/MillerThomsonLaw\/","https:\/\/x.com\/millerthomson","https:\/\/www.linkedin.com\/company\/miller-thomson-llp\/","https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/@millerthomson"]},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/en\/#\/schema\/person\/5473b50a564d1e37f327fdd79cb348f6","name":"Katherine Chan","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/en\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/da8a18c240b27905220d948a87957ba19ab6de326b44a2ce3072235c121f996f?s=96&d=mm&r=g","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/da8a18c240b27905220d948a87957ba19ab6de326b44a2ce3072235c121f996f?s=96&d=mm&r=g","caption":"Katherine Chan"}}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5021","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5021"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5021\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/14399"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5021"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5021"},{"taxonomy":"insight-format","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.millerthomson.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/insight-format?post=5021"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}