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Collateral Attack - Contrasted With Other Doctrine. Resler v. Anglin
In Resler v. Anglin (SCC, 2026) the Supreme Court of Canada dismissed a defendant's SCC appeal, this brought against an Alberta CA ruling that allowed an appeal where the Alberta QB struck the plaintiff's "amended statement of claim in its entirety, finding that it amounted to an abuse of process, disclosed no reasonable cause of action and, in any case, the allegations had no reasonable chance of success given Resler’s common law and statutory immunities".
Here the Supreme Court of Canada considers the doctrine of abuse of process, and whether collateral attack is a contained doctrine within it:(2) Anglin’s Claim Is Not an Abuse of Process
[45] Resler’s position on collateral attack forms part of his overarching argument that Anglin’s claim should be struck as an abuse of process, since he approaches collateral attack as a facet of this doctrine (A.F., at para. 56). As Resler did not clearly distinguish the two doctrines, I will consider whether his submissions support the broader conclusion that the claim constitutes an abuse of process.
[46] As discussed above, the collateral attack doctrine is to be construed narrowly. In contrast, abuse of process is a flexible principle that “engages the inherent power of the court to prevent the misuse of its procedure, in a way that would be manifestly unfair to a party to the litigation before it or would in some other way bring the administration of justice into disrepute” (C.U.P.E., at para. 37, quoting Canam Enterprises Inc. v. Coles (2000), 2000 CanLII 8514 (ON CA), 51 O.R. (3d) 481 (C.A.), at para. 55). Like collateral attack, the doctrine of abuse of process is primarily concerned with preserving the integrity of the court’s adjudicative function. As Arbour J., writing for the majority, observed in C.U.P.E., “[w]hether it serves to disentitle the Crown from proceeding because of undue delays, or whether it prevents a civil party from using the courts for an improper purpose, the focus is less on the interest of parties and more on the integrity of judicial decision making as a branch of the administration of justice” (para. 43 (citations omitted)). Its reach, however, is much broader. Over time, Canadian courts have relied on their inherent power to prevent abuse of process primarily to bar relitigation in circumstances where the strict specific requirements of issue estoppel or cause of action estoppel are not satisfied, yet allowing the claim to proceed would still offend principles of judicial economy, consistency, and finality (paras. 37 and 42; see also Lange, at pp. 201-4). This confirms the doctrine’s wider scope.
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