Docket: A-325-16
Citation: 2016 FCA 284
Present: STRATAS
J.A.
|
BETWEEN:
|
|
CANADIAN
NATIONAL RAILWAY COMPANY
|
|
Applicant
|
|
and
|
|
BNSF RAILWAY
COMPANY, RICHARDSON INTERNATIONAL LIMITED AND CANADIAN TRANSPORTATION AGENCY
|
|
Respondents
|
REASONS
FOR ORDER
STRATAS J.A.
[1]
The applicant seeks a stay of certain
administrative proceedings (case no. 16-01380) currently before the Canadian
Transportation Agency. The applicant did not ask the Agency to suspend its
proceedings. Rather, relying on section 50 of the Federal Courts Act,
R.S.C. 1985, c. F-7, the applicant comes directly to this Court by way of
notice of application.
[2]
The Registry sent the notice of application to
this Court for examination under Rule 74 of the Federal Courts Rules,
SOR/98-106. Rule 74 empowers this Court to review a document that has been
filed to determine if its filing is not “in accordance
with [the] Rules or pursuant to an order of the Court or an Act of Parliament.”
If that is the case, then the Court can “order that
[the] document…be removed from the Court file” but only after the
parties have had a chance to make submissions: Rule 74(2); Rock-St Laurent
v. Canada (Citizenship and Immigration), 2012 FCA 192, 434 N.R. 144.
[3]
In this case, after examining the notice of
application, the Court asked the parties for submissions on whether the notice
of application should be removed from this Court’s file and the court file
closed.
[4]
The parties have filed their submissions. The
Court must now determine whether the filing of the notice of application was
proper within the meaning of Rule 74.
[5]
In my view, in these circumstances, the filing
of the notice of application is contrary to the Canada Transportation Act,
S.C. 1996, c. 10. Therefore, under the authority of Rule 74, I shall order that
the notice of application be removed from the court file and the court file be
closed.
[6]
In their submissions, the parties devoted some
attention to section 50 of the Federal Courts Act. Rule 300 of the Federal
Courts Rules is also potentially relevant. So is the scheme of the Canada
Transportation Act. In these reasons, I consider these matters in that
order.
[7]
In my view, no objection can be taken to the
applicant’s notice of application on the basis of section 50 of the Federal
Courts Act or Rule 300 of the Federal Courts Rules.
[8]
Section 50 of the Federal Courts Act sets
out circumstances where stays can be granted. Relevant here is paragraph 50(1)(b)
of the Federal Courts Act. It allows the Court to grant stays of “proceedings in any cause or matter…where for any other
reason it is in the interests of justice that the proceedings be stayed.”
In my view, this wording, read literally, is broad enough to include stays of
administrative proceedings.
[9]
That literal reading is supported by other
sections in the Federal Courts Act and its overall purposes. The Act
vests in the Federal Courts broad powers of supervision of the actions of
federal boards, commissions and other tribunals: Canada (Human Rights
Commission) v. Canadian Liberty Net, [1998] 1 S.C.R. 626, 157 D.L.R. (4th)
385; Canada (National Revenue) v. RBC Life Insurance Company, 2013 FCA
50, 443 N.R. 378. The power to stay administrative proceedings is one that a
supervisory court would need on occasion to discharge its mandate. The literal
wording of paragraph 50(1)(b) sets out exactly that power.
[10]
In these circumstances, was a notice of
application the proper way for the applicant to seek a stay from this Court
under paragraph 50(1)(b)? In my view it was. Rule 300 of the Federal
Courts Rules allows for “proceedings required or
permitted by or under an Act of Parliament to be brought by an application,
motion, originating notice of motion, originating summons or petition.”
A stay is a proceeding that is “permitted by or under
an Act of Parliament,” namely the Federal Courts Act, paragraph
50(1)(b). In a case like this, where there is not already a subsisting
proceeding before the Court, an originating document, such as a notice of
application, should be filed. This the applicant did.
[11]
I note for completeness that had the applicant
erred and filed a notice of motion rather than an application, the matter could
have been cured by resort to Rule 57.
[12]
I now turn to a particular submission made by
the respondents, one that, as we shall see, requires us to consider the scheme
of the Canada Transportation Act.
[13]
The respondents submit that the notice of
application should be removed from the file because the applicant has proceeded
prematurely to the Court. The respondents note that the applicant did not ask
the Agency to adjourn its proceedings. They say that asking the Agency to
adjourn its proceedings was an adequate alternative recourse the applicant
should have pursued before seeking a stay in this Court.
[14]
There is much force in this submission. Where,
as here, a party is seeking to stay an administrative decision-maker’s
proceedings, the party is actually seeking prohibition of those proceedings. It
is requesting an order that the administrative decision-maker stop its
proceedings. In circumstances such as these, the standards governing the grant
of a section 50 stay of an administrative decision-maker’s proceedings must
mirror those for the grant of prohibition.
[15]
Just as prohibition is an administrative law
remedy that should not be pursued where there is adequate alternative recourse
or a lack of extraordinary circumstances or unusual urgency (see Canada
(Border Services Agency) v. C.B. Powell Limited, 2010 FCA 61, [2011] 2
F.C.R. 332), the same is true for an application for a stay of the sort brought
here. The rationales preventing early or premature access to a reviewing court
canvassed in C.B. Powell at para. 32 apply equally here too.
[16]
This is not just judge-made doctrine. It falls
out of the scheme of the Canada Transportation Act, a law binding upon this
Court. Under the Canada Transportation Act Parliament has given the
Agency full power over proceedings before it, including determining whether the
Agency should adjourn or suspend proceedings before it. Allowing parties to
bypass the Agency and go directly to court to suspend the Agency’s proceedings
would offend that statutory scheme. It would not be in accordance with or
pursuant to the Canada Transportation Act.
[17]
There may be circumstances of exceptionality or
unusual urgency such that immediate recourse to the Agency is not adequate (see
e.g., C.B. Powell, above at para. 33) and immediate access to a
court must be permitted. In this case, I need not comment further: the notice
of application reveals no circumstances of unusual urgency or other exceptional
reasons why immediate access to a court is necessary.
[18]
The applicant did not first ask the Agency to
suspend or adjourn its proceedings. It should have. Instead, it proceeded
directly to this Court by way of notice of application. Proceeding directly to
this Court in these circumstances is contrary to the statutory scheme in the Canada
Transportation Act. Therefore, under Rule 74, the notice of application
should be removed from the Court file and the court file closed.
[19]
As well, a second, related objection is
well-founded in my view: in these circumstances the notice of application
improperly bypasses the jurisdictional limitations imposed on this Court by
subsection 41(1) of the Canada Transportation Act.
[20]
Had the applicant asked the Agency to suspend or
adjourn its proceedings, the Agency would have decided that matter. An appeal
to this Court from that decision might have then been possible under subsection
41(1) of the Canada Transportation Act. But under that subsection, this
Court can only entertain appeals from the Agency on “questions
of law” and “questions of jurisdiction.”
[21]
Here, even if the applicant had asked the Agency
to suspend or adjourn its proceedings and the Agency had refused, a notice of
appeal raising the grounds that the applicant raised in the notice of
application now before this Court would not satisfy the requirement that there
be “questions of law” or “questions of jurisdiction.” While this Court has
interpreted the requirement in subsection 41(1) liberally, there needs to be “enough of a legal component” to the issue raised: Northwest
Airlines Inc. v. Canadian Transportation Agency, 2004 FCA 238 at para. 28,
325 N.R. 147; Canadian National Railway Company v. Canada (Transportation
Agency), 2016 FCA 266 at para. 22. Here there is none. The notice of
application merely asserts that the continuance of the case is duplicative of
other proceedings and an abuse of process, nothing more.
[22]
One last issue must be determined. Is this
application to be determined by one judge or by three judges of this Court? In
other words, do I have the jurisdiction to decide this matter as a single
judge?
[23]
The parties did not raise this issue but that
does not matter. The Court must still satisfy itself that it has the power to
act: Re McKittrick Properties Ltd. (1926), 59 O.L.R. 199 (C.A.); Manie
v. Ford (Town) (1918), 14 O.W.N. 83 (H.C.), aff’d (1918), 15 O.W.N. 27
(C.A.). The Court can never assume or presume it has jurisdiction over a
matter, nor can it ever exercise a jurisdiction that it does not have: Brooke
v. Toronto Belt Line Railway Company (1891), 21 O.R. 401; C.N.R. v.
Lewis, [1930] Ex. C.R. 145. This is a bedrock principle of our democracy,
one that has been on the books for at least a quarter of a millennium and one
that remains good law: see e.g., Green v. Rutherford (1750),1
Ves. Sen. 462 at page 471; Penn v. Lord Baltimore (1750), 1 Ves. Sen.
444 at page 446; A.G. v. Lord Hotham (1827), 3 Russ. 415; Thompson v.
Sheil (1840), 3 Ir. Eq. R. 135. Reflecting the venerable and fundamental
nature of this principle, this Court has held that jurisdictional matters such
as this should be decided before embarking upon any consideration of the merits
of the case: National Indian Brotherhood v. Juneau (No. 2), [1971] F.C.
73 (C.A.). Therefore, before considering the merits of this application, I
carefully considered my jurisdiction to act as a single judge.
[24]
Under subsection 16(1) of the Federal Courts
Act, “[e]xcept as otherwise provided in [the Federal
Courts Act] or any other Act of Parliament”—a proviso that does not
apply here—applications for leave to appeal, applications for judicial review
and references must be determined by at least three judges. The application
here does not fall within these categories and so it need not be determined by
at least three judges.
[25]
Subsection 16(1) goes on to say that “[o]therwise, the business of the Federal Court of Appeal
shall be dealt with by such judge or judges as the Chief Justice of that court
may arrange.” This contemplates that applications other than
applications for leave to appeal and applications for judicial review may be
determined by a single judge if the Chief Justice arranges for a single judge
to hear it. In this case, the Chief Justice has arranged for me to deal with
this application as a single judge.
[26]
Therefore, in my view, I have the jurisdiction
as a single judge to determine this application.
[27]
I note that in a related application before the
Court, the applicant seeks leave to appeal from an interlocutory decision
(decision LET-R-43-2016 dated September 7, 2016) made by the Agency in the same
case (case no. 16-01380). The Court has not yet determined that application. If
this Court grants leave to appeal, the applicant is at liberty to bring a
motion for a stay of the case pending determination of the appeal. The
determination of this application is without prejudice to the applicant’s
ability to bring such a motion.
[28]
For the benefit of future cases I see no reason
in this case why the applicant did not bring its motion within the application
for leave to appeal, rather than doing what it did here—launching an entirely
separate application. Bringing a motion within a subsisting proceeding is the
more conventional and simpler way to proceed. It may have substantive effects
too: separate applications, such as the one here, smack of an application for
prohibition and may be governed by the law of prohibition, not the law
governing interlocutory stays set out in RJR—MacDonald Inc. v. Canada
(Attorney General), [1994] 1 S.C.R. 311, 111 D.L.R. (4th) 385. Perhaps the
law in these two areas is converging so that does not matter; I need not decide
this here. However, either way—as set out in C.B. Powell, above, at
para. 33 and cases that apply that holding—premature forays to a reviewing
court are frowned upon unless the moving party can demonstrate unusual urgency
or exceptionality within the meaning of the cases.
[29]
For the foregoing reasons, I will order that the
notice of application be removed from the court file and the court file be
closed. Costs will be awarded to the respondents.
“David Stratas”
Email this Content