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Public Interest - Licensing. Registrar, Alcohol and Gaming Commission of Ontario v. Two-Four-Seven Lounge and Restaurant Inc.
In Registrar, Alcohol and Gaming Commission of Ontario v. Two-Four-Seven Lounge and Restaurant Inc. (Ont Divisional Ct, 2025) the Divisional Court dismissed a JR, here where the "Registrar, Alcohol and Gaming Commission of Ontario (the “Registrar” and “AGCO”) seeks judicial review of the decision and reconsideration decision of the Licence Appeal Tribunal (the “LAT” or the “Tribunal”)".
The court reviews the concept of 'public interest', here in a liquor licensing context:[6] Given this, the LAT held that the Registrar had met its onus of proving that there were reasonable and probable ground for believing that the Licencee will not carry on business in accordance with the law and with integrity and honesty. However, rather than revoking the Licencee’s licence, the LAT found that the public interest could be satisfied by imposing a 30-day suspension of the Licencee’s licence with terms and conditions.
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[9] The Registrar seeks judicial review of the LAT’s decisions on the basis that they are unreasonable, for three reasons:1. The LAT’s reliance on the public interest is unjustifiable in the context of the Act;
2. The LAT failed to provide an explanation as to what it meant by the “public interest”, which is an amorphous term with multiple meanings; and
3. The LAT’s decisions fail to reveal a rational chain of analysis because the LAT used the notion of public interest to give Mr. Balogun a second chance. The public interest is meant to cover the interests of society broadly and not the interests of any one individual or business. ....
[11] I disagree with the Registrar’s submissions that the LAT’s decisions were unreasonable and could not be justified in the context of the Act. The Act, like many licencing statutes that regulate businesses, requires that those businesses not be conducted in a way that would harm the public interest, by requiring them to operate in accordance with the law so that the public’s safety is not endangered.
[12] In this case, there was an obvious concern because the LAT accepted that the Licensee had not conducted its business in accordance with the law or with honesty and integrity. Nevertheless, it found that the public interest could be satisfied with a penalty that fell short of revocation – namely a suspension and the imposition of terms.
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