Case information

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Case summaries are prepared by the Office of the Registrar of the Supreme Court of Canada (Law Branch). Please note that summaries are not provided to the Judges of the Court. They are placed on the Court file and website for information purposes only.

Administrative law - Judicial review - Standard of review - Procedural fairness - Legal obligation to give reasons - Tribunal determining that common law spouse was entitled to pension death benefits - Whether duty of impartiality owed by counsel to an administrative tribunal generally precludes tribunal counsel from a substantive appeal from an order granting judicial review - Whether Canadian jurisprudence should permit an administrative tribunal to ignore rules of documentary production and evidentiary rule of drawing an adverse inference against a party who has refused to produce documents essential to the normal determination of spousal status in a family law proceeding - Whether Canadian jurisprudence should permit an administrative tribunal to be relieved of the procedural and evidentiary principles enunciated in Dunsmuir v. New Brunswick, [2008] 1 S.C.R. 190.

The Applicant, Sylvia Clifford, applied for judicial review of a decision of the Respondent Ontario Municipal Employees Retirement System ("OMERS") Appeal Sub-Committee ("the Tribunal") in which the Tribunal determined that Bernadette Campbell was the common law spouse of the late Tony Clifford at the time of his death and that, as such, she was entitled to his OMERS pension death benefits. Sylvia Clifford is the former spouse of Tony Clifford and was the named beneficiary under his pension plan.

The Divisional Court, in a majority decision, concluded that the Tribunal was required to give reasons but had failed to adequately do so. It allowed the judicial review application and quashed the Tribunal's decision. The Court of Appeal allowed the appeal and dismissed the application for judicial review.