The Crown applied to strike the Plaintiffs’ Statement of Claim in its entirety. In the alternative, the Crown sought to have the Action dismissed against some Defendants and have some portions of the Statement of Claim struck.

The Crown made a number of objections to the Statement of Claim, including that large parts of the pleadings were “irrelevant, improper, contradictory, repetitive, inflammatory, frivolous and/or vexatious or plead facts not evidence or argument”. The Crown argued that the pleadings offended Rule 3.68(2)(c). The Court agreed with the Crown’s argument; however, the Court noted that the issue with striking pleadings lay entirely with the limitation period. If the Statement of Claim was struck, the Plaintiffs would be out of time to bring a new claim on the same matters. The Court thus held that it would be unjust to the Plaintiffs to strike the pleadings and allowed the Plaintiffs to amend the claim to cure any deficiencies.

The Court also noted that the failure by the Plaintiffs to bring a proper claim for any financial loss under the Survival of Actions Act, RSA 2000, c. S-27, by the executor or administrator had been cured by Rule 2.11(e), which allowed for a litigation representative to be appointed for an estate that has not obtained a grant under the Surrogate Rules.