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LAT - Reconsideration. Landa v. The Dominion of Canada General Insurance Company
In Landa v. The Dominion of Canada General Insurance Company (Div Court, 2024) the Divisional Court dismissed an appeal/JR challenge to a LAT reconsideration [under LAT Rules 18]:The Merits Reconsideration Decision
[85] Ms. Landa requested a reconsideration of the Merits Decision. She sought a rehearing of her claims in their entirety and sought to rely on new evidence. In denying her request, the LAT set out the test that Ms. Landa had to meet under Rule 18 of the Tribunal’s Common Rules of Practice and Procedure at paragraph 9:The grounds for a request for reconsideration to be allowed are contained in Rule 18 of the Tribunal’s Common Rules of Practice and Procedure. A request for reconsideration under Rule 18.2 will not be granted unless one or more of the following criteria are met:a) The Tribunal acted outside its jurisdiction or violated the rules of procedural fairness;
b) The Tribunal made an error of law or fact such that the Tribunal would likely have reached a different result had the error not been made;
c) The Tribunal heard false evidence from a party or witness, which was discovered only after the hearing and likely affected the result; or
d) There is evidence that was not before the Tribunal when rendering its decision, could not have been obtained previously by the party now seeking to introduce it, and would likely have affected the result. ....
[92] Citing P.P. v. Wawanesa Mutual Insurance Company, 2021 CanLII 60480 (ON LAT), the LAT noted, at para. 23, that a tribunal “does not have to refer to every argument or piece of evidence cited by a party”. It also noted that a reconsideration hearing was not intended to allow parties to reargue their positions. Rather, the applicant “must convincingly show” that the Tribunal violated the rules of procedure or natural justice. In our view, the LAT was correct in its interpretation of the applicable law and legal principles.
[93] The LAT concluded that while Ms. Landa disagreed with the Merits Decision, she had not established that the test for a reconsideration of the Merits Decision was met.
[94] The LAT concluded that Ms. Landa was relying on the same case law, was seeking to repeat and reargue the “substantive position” and submissions she had made to the LAT on the Merits hearing. The LAT acknowledged that there may have been “small, administrative or typography errors in the Merits Decision” but that there had been no error of fact or law that would lead to a different outcome.
[95] We see no error of law in the analysis undertaken by the LAT in the Merits Reconsideration Decision. It correctly considered and applied the applicable law and procedural Rules. We also see no procedural unfairness to Ms. Landa: the LAT considered her submissions and provided a clear, well-reasoned, and logical decision, which was reasonable in the result.
....
[99] This court has held on numerous occasions that the fact that a request for reconsideration is heard by the same member who made the original decision does not give rise to a reasonable apprehension of bias and is not procedurally unfair (see for example Warren v. Licence Appeal Tribunal, 2022 ONSC 3741 (Div. Ct.) at paras. 18-22).
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