Legal Research

OSCAR vs. FRANK Continues

By Simon Fodden

Just about a month ago I reported here that CourtCanada, the private software development company that had a deal with Ontario to provide some court services, had sued the Ontario government for breaching an understanding. The statement of claim [PDF] was made available then. CourtCanada’s electronic booking system, OSCAR (Online System for Court Attendance Reservations) was implemented in the Estates Court as a pilot project and expanded to the Commercial Court, where it ran alongside FRANK, the government electronic booking system in place for a number of years. In essence, the dispute is about the government’s decision not to expand the use of OSCAR to other courts and, indeed, to cease its use in Commercial Court.

Now the Ontario government has filed a statement of defence [PDF] and CourtCanada a reply [PDF].

There’s nothing particularly noteworthy about the statement of defence from an outside point of view — it accepts and denies various allegations in the claim and asserts its view of events. The reply, though, seems — to my unpracticed eye, at least — to be characterized by strong language. The opening paragraph begins thus:

1. The Plaintiff denies all allegations except those which are expressly admitted. A blanket denial of the allegations in the Statement of Defence is appropriate in this case because the Defence is replete with false and misleading statements. The Defendant, not having a valid defence on the merits, has chosen subterfuge and obfuscation over the truth

Other examples include:

. . . the Defendant?s flagrant misrepresentation of the truth . . .

. . . the Defendant?s attempt to mislead . . .

This allegation is an attempt to cover up the Defendant?s sabotage of OSCAR . . .

Perhaps this is standard fare in litigation — it is, after all, a form of “plain language,” which might be a welcome alternative to more stilted traditional expressions. On the other hand, it’s not clear to me how the insertion of rhetoric at this stage of proceedings against the government could assist matters. CourtCanada’s counsel, Martin Teplitsky, is an experienced and talented litigator, however, who will almost certainly have his reasons for this tack.

What do the litigators among our readership think about this use of rhetoric?

Full post as published by Slaw.ca on August 19, 2010 (boomark / email).